


Rise 6

by reilgun



Series: Fade [6]
Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: Child Abuse, Eating Disorders, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Original Character(s), Trans Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-06-03
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:55:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 35,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24201682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reilgun/pseuds/reilgun
Series: Fade [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1514456
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	1. 6.0 Cast List

**Aggregate/Chimera:** Okay so normally I do haha jokes but I want it said that their interlude was really hard to write because the last thing I want to do is spread misinformation or increase stigma. And honestly it took a lot not to just spout DID facts the entire thing, so if you want more info (please) check out MultiplicityAndMe, DissociaDID, and The Entropy System. There are lots of other youtubers with great videos on the topic but those are my personal favorites. Please don’t call Fishbone evil, he’s hurting a lot and very reasonably paranoid and just wants to stop others from going through what he did.

 **Ascendants:** Your new gods. Closer to coming than they were in the arc 5 cast list.

 **Ashley:** Why couldn’t ASHLEY have been Aggregate’s therapist?? :\

 **Attrition:** Some villain. Hint: he’s one of Hush’s monsters :O

 **Aviary:** It’s a bird! It’s a- oh it’s a bird. THREE birds! Evil birds!!!! 

**Beth:** Quiet bully.. friend?

 **Blare:** Protectorate Tinker who makes sound-based equipment. A nice friendly lad.

 **Boomer:** Rave enthusiast. Doesn’t have powers. He’s ok.

 **Boon/Andy Sinzel:** Tinker, tentative leader of the Wards. His tech speeds up natural regeneration and provides steroid effects for physical and cognitive abilities, but comes with a downside.

 **Breaker:** Stranger of the Mixup Marshals. Appears to be a clone of whoever is looking at them. Very short, not a child.

 **Changer:** Mover of the Mixup Marshals. He’s got no limit on his speed, but can only go fast when touching living organic material. Turns out most organic material burns up if you go too fast.

 **Conciliator:** Tinker who can disable/revert the effects of powers. Very expensive.

 **Crow:** Aviary Stranger, used to be a Red Iron member by the name of Blank, but basically nobody knows that because of the nature of her power.

 **David Walker:** Counselor from hell, _needs to be taken down._ Come the fuck on, Quinn!

 **Eagle:** Aviary member, sister of Vulture.

 **Failsafe:** Red Iron guy who can’t have powers used on him or on things/people in a small radius around him.

 **Flicker:** Protectorate guy who can manipulate light with his power.

 **Forecast:** Leader of the Seekers. A major dickhole who controls the weather but it’s actually way cooler bro you just gotta read this six hour description of how his power works trust me he’s awesome it’s so worth the time bro

 **Forge:** Red Iron Tinker who makes turrets and numbing guns. A real nice bud pal friend of Iron Willy.

 **Fumer:** A member the Seekers. Please don’t make fart jokes about him.

 **Hush:** The leader of a group mostly called ‘Monsters’. Oh boy.

 **Iron Willy/Fiora:** Leader of the Red Iron. Gives the titty candy to children.

 **Jaunt:** Member of the Wards. Spends a minute as a big monster. Nice Guy but not the villain.

 **Kid Napper:** A member the Seekers. Has a big pillowy tumor on the side of his head. When he sleeps, astrally projects into people and senses everything they sense. Can influence them similarly to one’s subconscious. He’s like fourteen.

 **Legion/Flock/Whatever the fuck else:** Self cloner who has no other powers. Some of them are chill, as one would expect.

 **Magister:** A temporary Red Iron cape, now scrapped. Can temporarily create ‘black holes.’ A dumbass.

 **Meteor Maid/Marie:** Radar’s future wife. That didn’t stop being a thing. Also she’s alive.

 **Marionettist:** Member of the Wards. Controls arms with his arms, has to have line of sight and slowly loses control as it’s lost. Still the best boy.

 **Marissa:** Stupid bully.. friend?

 **Master:** Thinker leader of the Mixup Marshals, now disbanded. A real bad man, and not just because of his awful taste in outfits. Able to find the creative limits of people’s powers, as well as sensing those with powers from a relative distance.

 **Mixup Marshals:** No longer an organization of villains.

 **Mortar:** Gamer girl Wards member. She’s a human cannonball who can stick to walls, and she takes less damage the faster she’s moving. Wow some of the Wards really haven’t talked much.

 **Mrs. Foster:** Cape Studies teacher. Has an annoying voice.

 **Mr. Green:** Riley’s dad. He’s a doctor and actually supportive, whoa! A real stand up dude.

 **Mrs. Green:** Riley’s mom. :\

 **Ms. Holly:** Language Arts teacher. Teaches Language Arts.

 **Mr. Kelly:** Quinn’s dad. The worst. Bad.

 **Ms. Kelly:** Quinn’s mom. Does all of the drugs. 

**Mr. Larson:** Social Studies teacher. A little bitch.

 **Partition/Eddie:** Co-Leader of the Wards, no matter what anyone says. Invulnerable to any damage he can perceive ahead of time, with faster reaction speed. He’s gay, I like him.

 **Precursor:** Mysterious girl who can teleport and writes creepy letters to be proofread by her creepy boyfriend. A god. Your god.

 **Pythia:** Protectorate precog Labyrinth. I love her so much, this poor girl. Heart of gold.

 **Quinn Kelly:** A normal teenage girl.

 **Radar/Carl:** Blind Protectorate member who relies on his power to see. He also has a lie detector times 100 and can fly. Less of a dick than he used to be, but still a huge dick, but not as much of a dick as we may have thought?

 **Red Iron:** A ruthless/merciful organization of villains/vigilantes who murder the weak/destroy the evil. But of course, their biggest crime is giving GENDER CHANGING DRUGS to CHILDREN!!!!

 **Riley Green/Shift/Blueline:** Evil for boobs. Valid as fuck.

 **Rue/Barb:** She’s a Wards member who hurts people by hurting herself, and she’s got a zipper mouth on her costume. She’s great, I love her. Maybe some day she will be happy with Quinn. Maybe some day Quinn will stop being a bitch.

 **Sandra:** They broke a perfectly good bully.

 **Shaker:** Brute of the Mixup Marshals. To quote my personal character list: “She can kick things so hard. So fucking hard. God damn.”

 **Seekers:** A group of Case 53s. New in town.

 **Specter Shy:** Ward member, can only be seen when being directly looked at. Those who don’t know she’s around experience malfunctions in their powers. Not transphobic anymore! She had one conversation and now she’s cured of all of it!!

 **Sprawler:** Some Protectorate member. She showed up, technically.

 **Striker:** Blaster of the Mixup Marshals. Shoots bright lasers. Might yet have a hopeful future.

 **Stroke:** Red Iron. Able to remove someone’s ability to communicate for around a day when she witnesses them doing that.

 **Sudsmission:** Protectorate dork who can trap people inside of bubbles. Fucking bubbles.

 **Trojan:** Protectorate member. Can become intangible until he goes through someone, then he controls them. To go intangible again, he has to give up control.

 **Trump:** Tinker of the Mixup Marshals. She makes very small copies of other Tinker tech.

 **Vincent Bugayong/Quaver:** Member of the Wards. His ability to warp space is linked to his voice, and ignores the Manton effect. Rifts created fade over time. Has less control the louder he goes. A good boy.

 **Vulture:** Leader of the Aviary, sisters with Eagle.

 **Zenith:** One of the two members of the Ascendants. God complex. I wonder what power he has to back it up?


	2. Rise 6.1

Being Quinn Kelly was fairly normal these days, with a whole lot of mess all around me and little way to deal with it. I’d grown past the need to pretend I was special enough to handle what the capes struggled with, and it was for the better. Once all of my messes were cleaned up, I could just focus on school and helping Riley, Vincent, and Barb out whenever and however they needed. I’d finally accepted that I was an occasional sidekick at best, and that was good enough for me. Maybe some day I’d get to be a hero, but until then I could just be me.

Riley and I would have to go back to school once the weekend was over, and that meant dealing with David. I’d been putting it off for selfish reasons, looking for some sort of replacement for my addiction, but now was time for me to make up for that. Once Riley finished her shower, I’d be talking to her about what to do. Would she still want to go through with the Red Iron plan? If so, I didn’t have any room to object anymore, if I even did beforehand.

Once that was done, I could hang out with Barb again.  _ That’ll be nice. She’ll appreciate this a lot, I think, seeing how much I’ve changed. It’ll be nice to just be around her again. Things were going so well, and..  _ The thought of her face warmed me up, when I hadn’t even realized I was a little chilly. I got so distracted by the thought that I nearly missed it when the pattering of water ended.

_ Okay. _ I sat myself up on the bed and straightened my dress. There was still some sense of disbelief at the fact that I’d worn a  _ dress _ without intending to go anywhere. Wearing them was nice, but I didn’t tend to ditch my signature headband, skirt, with a collared long sleeve top under a t-shirt unless something special was going on. Granted, my idea of something special was a fairly low bar now, so..  _ Guess this is just the new me.  _ That train of thought came to a close as Riley walked into the room.

“Oh, hey, didn’t realize you were up already.” She dropped off her dirty clothes in the bin and started looking through her closet for something to wear. I never got why she didn’t just pick an outfit out before getting into the shower, but it didn’t matter.

“Yeah, I woke up a little bit ago, I think near the start of your shower. Got dressed and have just been waiting, I suppose.”

“Huh, alright.” When she finally picked out something nice, I turned myself around and looked at the wall so she could get dressed without me watching. “You feeling alright? I was barely awake when you got home last night but you seemed kinda off when you told me you wanted to talk in the morning, and.. you still seem kinda off.”

“I’ve just had some time to think. Had a realization, I guess.”

“Oh.” She grunted a little. “Okay, I guess.”  _ Mm..  _ She sounded off too, but in a different way. Her voice was a little softer, a little higher.

“You sound nice,” I concluded.

“Huh?”

“Just, your voice, I mean. Whatever you’re doing with it is nice. Feminine.”

“Oh.” I could almost  _ hear _ the blush in the way her voice shook. “Thanks, I.. I guess I just decided I wanted to take it more seriously. Since I’m starting HRT soon thanks to Dad and.. all that.”

“Ah, that makes sense. I still stand by the fact that you look basically cis in most ways, by the way. You’re going to look really good.” I took a second to imagine it. Would she be growing her hair out? What would she do about school? Maybe we’d just go somewhere new next year, and she could hide it until then. Probably wouldn’t be too hard.

“Thanks, I..” The way she trailed off made it seem like she was hiding something, and given her new ‘job’, she probably was.  _ Not my place. _ “Thanks, yeah.”

“Well, I’m excited at least. I hope you are too, since this is for you.”

“Of course I’m excited, I just- You can turn around now.” I did, and she was wearing her cute blue dress that she picked up a few weeks earlier.

“Aww, cute.”

“Yeah- I mean thanks, and, uh..” She sat down next to me, shoulder to shoulder, which was a very welcome change from how things had been the night before. “Yeah, I’m excited, it’s just scary.”

“Mm.” I leaned my head on hers - still a little wet. “I can get that, yeah.”

“Yeah..” She fiddled around with the blue ocean of fabric that draped over her for a little bit. “Oh yeah, right, you wanted to talk.”

“Mhm.” I hummed and removed myself from her shoulder so I could look at her directly. Just to make things easy for her, I moved over to the chair and sat across from her so she wouldn’t have to turn her head. “God, you look so cute.”  _ The shower makes her look a little softer than usual. Does she moisturize? _ “Do you moisturize?”

“What?” She blinked. “Uh, no?”

“Oh, huh. You should.”

“Uh.. Alright?” Confusion overflowed her and dripped from her expression. “Was that.. what you had to talk about?”

“Nah, just popped into my mind. But yeah, anyways, I did a lot of thinking last night about who I am and what I’m doing with my life, you know? And I came to some conclusions I previously would’ve been too afraid to accept.

“Most importantly, Riley, I want to apologize for how I’ve been since you triggered, and to a lesser extent how I’ve been all my life. I’ve never been good at valuing your opinions at the same weight as my own, and with you as a cape now, that’s even less of a valid thing. I’m going to listen to what you have to say more, and I’m going to be a better friend. No more stupid bullshit. No more going and getting myself hurt.

“And, to really solidify that, I want us to talk about the David thing again. I’m ready to hear you out on the Red Iron plan. I’m willing to trust you if you think you know what’s best, and again I’m sorry for causing all of this shit with Sandra. I’ve made so many messes in my life, but none of them compare to the awful shit recently that I’ve been forcing you to clean up. We’re going to do this how you think is best, and I’m going to do  _ my _ best, whatever that is, to make things up to you.” It seemed better  _ not _ to mention that I would be exceeding my limits to reach that best.

“Uhh..” She reached up and held the back of her neck with one hand, giving me an awkward and somewhat uncomfortable look. “Okay? I mean, some of that sounds really nice, but other parts are..” A long moment passed with what looked like intense consideration for her next words. In between the waiting, she glanced over at my laptop, as if to silently question if there was a deeper meaning to me skipping my morning forum browsing. Then, though, she just looked at me.

_ No power? _ Though it was probably just intended to make her look like talking took less effort than it did, her blue-induced communication skills were usually pretty nice. Why, then, was she choosing to sit and stare out in the open this time?  _ You couldn’t have used your power in the shower, so is this from yesterday?  _ Before I got into stupid delusional Hell Quinn time, I just concluded that she wasn’t feeling up to it.

“Mm, I guess I’m happy for you?” she eventually said with a shrug. “I’ll let it be for now and just see how this goes, I guess. I want what’s best for you, too, and.. so yeah. And.. I don’t know, I’m proud of you I guess? I don’t know what to say, really. Let’s just talk David stuff, then?”

“Mhm.”  _ She’ll understand eventually. _ I eagerly awaited her thoughts on what to do, though they didn’t come. “Well..?”

“Oh, uh..” She shrugged. “I don’t know, I guess just the same as before. We take David to Iron Willy and let her- Er, fuck, uh, can you pretend you didn’t hear that?” I nodded.  _ Not my place to know.  _ “Thanks, uh.. So.. Now that I think about it, this is a dumb plan. We could just.. Call the PRT to come deal with him? I mean, this really doesn’t need to be a thing involving us. We just tell them his power and they can send people who can resist it, and bam.”

My first instinct was to remind her that we  _ didn’t _ want to make a big show of things, so as to avoid panic, but who was I to decide what we wanted? I held my hands together and nodded.

“Alright, that sounds good. When are you thinking?”

“Uhhh..” She glanced over at the clock, as if it would tell her what day it was. How bad was her sense of time getting with the use of her power? What would happen if she fully lost track for good? “I don’t know, now? Or, mm, I don’t know if.. I’m a little busy today, and tomorrow, so uh.. Monday? We’ll do it Monday, right before school. Sound good?”

“Absolutely, whatever you say.” I smiled at her, holding back on telling her the issues I had, and she gave me a concerned smile of her own in return. No matter what it took, I would have to learn to give her the respect she deserved. Even if it killed me.

* * *

“Quinn?” Riley called from her room. I’d just gotten back from my jog, and was only barely a few steps into the house. As quickly as I could be, I was talking to her face to face, peering through her door.

“Yeah?”

“Uh, so” - she held out her costume to me, showing off a tear in the shoulder - “I ripped this some time while working with Willy, not even sure how since I wasn’t wearing it, but.. I don’t think I can get this fixed up at Ward HQ, and I also won’t be seeing Willy soon enough that I can just have her get someone to fix it. Could you-” I was already taking it out of her hands and looking for my sewing kit. “Um, thanks. Sorry.”

“It’s no worry, really. What are friends for?” I rustled through her closet.  _ Where’d I put it? _

“Mm, I.. I guess. Thanks.” Once I found what I needed, I got to work right then and there. “Uhh, Quinn?”

“Hmm?” Pausing, I looked up to her - alert, ready for more.

“Ah, just..” She gazed over me, seeming uncomfortable. “Um, aren’t you going to get changed first?”

“Oh.” I’d completely spaced it; I was getting my sweat all over her costume. “Fuck, right, sorry.” I got up and delicately placed it on her bed, grabbed something from my side of the closet without looking, and bolted to the bathroom. Once I finished undressing, wiping myself off with a wet washcloth, drying myself off as quickly as I could, and putting on the new outfit, I ran back to Riley’s room and got started again.

“Whoa whoa whoa, Quinn.” Her hand on my shoulder shocked me, and the instinctual jolt of my arm nearly made the tear worse. Even worse, I’d almost jabbed her in the face.

“Fuck.”  _ Fuck fuck fuck. _ “Are you okay?” I laid my hand on her cheek, inspecting her in case I hurt her without feeling it. Within an instant of me making contact, she was grabbing my wrist and pulling it off of her.

“Jesus, Quinn, are  _ you _ okay?” As my arm sat in her hand, the grip just tight enough to be a little uncomfortable, I lost it. ‘It’, in this case, was different from every other time I’d lost it. There was no crying, or yelling, or punching, or anything; I just stared at her, blinking.

_ Am  _ I _ okay? I’m..  _ Am _ I okay? Am I.. Am I.. It’s, right, I’m.. hallucinating? This is, I’m- _ I turned my head slowly away from Riley’s face, taking in the haze of the world as things moved just a split second too late.  _ This isn’t real, and I’m.. I’m being haunted, I’m being hunted. My.. past and my.. my.. _ I blinked again, and it took an eternity.

“Quinn!” Her voice finally caught my attention, having rattled on in my brain for a moment.

“Huh?” I looked at her, giving the focus she deserved.

_ “Are you okay?” _ The question hit me, and I realized I was concerning her. Everything I was doing, to make my impact on her less awful, and I was worrying her over nothing.  _ Over nothing, just me. _ Just..

“Yeah,” I said, trying my best to cover up my dissociation. I even shook my head for good measure, feigning that I’d suddenly snapped out of it. “Yeah, hah, sorry. Just spaced it, I’m okay.”

“It’s not.. it’s not just that, Quinn! You’re being.. I..” The glaze covering my eyes that I was trying  _ so _ fucking hard to counter -  _ just let me focus on her fucking face, god damn it  _ \- must have set her off. Or the way my mouth was idly laying open, making me look like an idiot. She hugged me, and the warmth crept in further, like a flood of fresh tears clouding my brain and my self and distorting my image.

“I love you.” The words stumbled out in a way that only seemed to make matters worse. No matter what I did, I always hurt her.  _ Broken. _

“Quinn, just.. Let’s just lay down and you can work on this later, okay?”  _ Huh. _ “Let’s just-” She pulled away one arm to push us up off the ground from the bed. I tried to support my end of the weight, but by the time I was ready to push up we were already on the mattress, splaying awkwardly and holding on, wrapped and twisted. “Yeah, okay? Let’s just take a nap and calm down and it’ll be okay.”

“Uh-huh.” I wished she wasn’t making such a big deal out of this. I wished I wasn’t hurting her. Drifting off, I wished I was better. A normal girl. I just wanted to be normal.  _ Don’t deserve her. Nuh-uh. _

* * *

“..and that’s.. it, I guess. I expected it to be more of a capital ‘t’ thing, but I guess that’s just not how real life works sometimes.”

“Yeah, shit’s dumb like that.” It was nice to see that Barb hadn’t really changed during our break.

“Guess so. I guess people just disappear from your life, sometimes. And, in this case, get arrested. Still kind of disappointing, even if it’s for the best. Expected some kind of battle, on some level, you know? Of wits? But.. nah.” I halfheartedly sighed, not really willing to commit to the melodrama. “Anyways, I’m walking with Vincent to his place if you wanna join us?”

“What, you’ve just been calling someone for like ten minutes while he’s just there?”

“I mean, like..” I looked over at him - his hands in his pockets, just strolling along. “Yeah? He doesn’t really care. Right, V?” He shrugged.

“Still kinda rude, but you do you.”

“Mm..”  _ I guess it  _ is _ pretty rude, and.. and it’s rude to Vincent, who.. Fuck. _ It was so easy to forget Vincent was a cape, given how much time of my life he’d just been ‘that guy over there’. “Right, uh, okay. I’ll see you at his place?”

“Oh, uhhh..” She trailed on for a little while. “Yeah, sure, why not.”

“Okay, I’ll see you soon.”

“Seeya.” As soon as the conversation was respectfully ended, I hung up and directed all of my attention to Vincent.

“Hey, V, sorry about that.” He shrugged again. “Or, well, not  _ hey, _ but you know. I don’t really know what’s gotten into me, I’m sorry. We can just, uh.. I don’t know, I’d put the ball in your corner but you can’t.. you know, and..”  _ Okay, just shut up. Meet him on his territory; just be quiet. Just take in the world and be observant and don’t say stupid shit for a bit. It’s not that hard, and it’s what he wants. _

_ I’m way too talkative with him, and I don’t view him as like.. I don’t know, when we’re in person I don’t know how to talk to him like he’s a person. But he is a person, and a very important one at that, and so just.. Just be quiet, and maybe he’s got some sort of passive language of his own. I mean, he  _ does, _ I know he does, so just pay attention to it. Just take him in and let yourself be a spectator for a bit. _

So I did, taking in every step he took, and watching his breaths in and out, and the way he carefully managed his facial expressions. Even with a weird girl staring at him, he kept his cool, just going along without even really reacting. He went along, and I did too, and I watched, and he went, and I followed, and I watched, and he moved and I saw, and he-

“Stop.” His mouth didn’t move, or I missed it. His image flittered a little bit, cutting and bending in some small myriad of places.  _ Oh, great. Great, one of these, this again.  _ Of course it would happen the  _ day  _ of the David shit being dealt with; a pretty blatant ‘this is your life now’ from the universe, or from my brain, or whatever the fuck. I was without his help now, and I wouldn’t have the chance to get it back ever again.

_ Didn’t deserve it. _ I closed my eyes, refusing to keep taking in Vincent’s distorted image. He deserved better than that, at least. Than me.  _ But, anyways. _ I walked along, letting my ears keep me from doing something stupid, fully aware that my ears weren’t to be trusted.  _ Better than. _ I just trudged forward, haze and a bit of confusion taking over, but not really.  _ But I’m fine, you know? _

And I was, and then we got to his place, and I didn’t even bump into him like an idiot or anything, and he knew I was breaking and he hated it and he wanted it to hurt, and it did kind of, and we just stayed on his bed, and he was on his laptop, and I wasn’t. My world was kind of fucked up, all around me, and I just sort of stared at the ceiling. And time passed for a while, and Vincent didn’t care, and that was okay, and that sucked.  _ God I feel weird. _

Then, sooner than I expected, Barb was in the room with us, and I felt a little better. She gave me a nice, sly smile, and I gave something back that probably didn’t even look like a smile at all.

“Hey, sinner.”  _ Oh yeah. _ Things clicked into place a bit. They still felt off, but in a manageable way.

“Hi.” My heart beat hard against my chest. “I missed you.” I clumsily, and somewhat embarrassingly, pushed myself into a sitting position.

“Missed you too. You doing alright?” Once the question was asked, Vincent responded with a nod, answering for me.  _ Am I? Yeah, I guess I am. _

“Now that you’re here,” I determined. She took off her coat, leaving her in a tanktop that nearly re-broke my brain, and leaned on me.

“Glad you did the right thing.” Her skin pressed against the fabric of my top, and I wished I was wearing something with shorter sleeves. “You’re cute.” With that comment, I realized last of everyone in the room that I was blushing  _ way _ more than anyone ever should have.

“Well..” I blinked, still just a little too foggy to come up with a good response. “Fuck you.” She smirked, and I smiled back in what was maybe recognizable as a weird grin, and then she ruffled my hair a bit. Normally I would’ve minded, but it was her, and I really didn’t care.

“Anyways” - she unzipped her bag - “Vince said you were feeling kinda shit so I picked up some ice cream on the way here.” With that said, she brought out a small carton of rocky road.

“Oh fuck.” I wasn’t sure which was winning between my fear of eating in front of other people and the amazement at just how nice it was that she’d gone out of her way to do that. Ultimately, though, I decided it’d be rude to decline after she spent money on it, and that was no good. “Thank you, um-”

“Vince, got any spoons?” Vincent just stared at her, leaning his head forward a little bit and squinting in disbelief. “Okay fine dumb question.  _ Where _ are your spoons- ah, fuck, that’s stupid too. Whatever, uh-” She handed me the carton and headed for the door. “Going to the kitchen, be back in a sec.”

“Okay,” I said, a bit too wistfully. My hands were cold and wet as they grasped the treat, precipitation -  _ condensation? _ \- condensation having built up a moist layer of stupid dumb sweat-like weirdness. What I minded more was just the fact that my mind wandered a bit at the comparison to sweat, because-  _ Stop being so creepy oh my fucking goooooooodddd. People sweat, it’s fucking like a normal weird dumb part of having a human body, it’s gross, don’t be gross! Ugh. _

_ What even is it about sweat? This is like the third time? Sweat’s just like, fucking gross? Guess it’s just because of what it means? Like, she just got off training or patrolling or something, and that’s cool to me, so I guess I associate the sweat with that and I think that’s cool? Because it’s not like my own sweat is anything I think about much beyond it just being gross, and I mean.. I don’t know, I don’t think about other people’s sweat? Just hers. I don’t know, I.. Please don’t let this be some gross fetishy thing. _

“Here,” Barb said, cutting through my thoughts like a spoon in ice cream. The analogy had come to mind, mostly likely, because of the spoon being handed to me for which to eat ice cream with. I took it and smiled at her, then popped open the lid and took a bite.

“Mmph, fuck.” I didn’t even really care for rocky road, usually, but this shit was  _ good.  _ Even more confounding, it was a place I’d tried before and not been much of a fan of. Coming to the conclusion that it didn’t matter and that I was probably just being gay, I took another bite. “Fuck.”

“Make sure you don’t get any on the bedsheets, babe.”  _ Oh shit, yeah, that’d be- _

“Babe?” I asked - a bit too excitedly - immediately after swallowing.

“Yeah, babe. Have I not called you that before?” Had she?

“I don’t think so?”

“Huh, well..” She sat down next to me, using another spoon to take out a large chunk of the ice cream for herself. “There you go.” She accentuated her statement by putting the huge glob into her mouth. How she didn’t get brainfreeze, I couldn’t have said.

“There I go,” I said softly, under my breath.  _ What did I do to make you think I’m worth it? _ I knew one thing, at least. “You’re amazing.”

“Pssh, nah.” The way she said it so casually and  _ immediately, _ as if one would be foolish to even consider something like that being real, was kind of baffling, in a nice way. “Vince is fucking amazing, if anything.” She reached over and patted him on the back.

He winced, and I wondered if she’d used her power to increase the impact, but remembered it didn’t really work like that, since his hand would end up being what hurt most of all. She’d just slapped him pretty hard. He groaned, in a highly restrained and practiced way that didn’t warp any of the room. I wasn’t sure how that worked, but it was impressive nonetheless.

“Well, I think you’re both amazing. You’ve got two of the coolest hero powers, if you ask me.” Though Barb had been in a good mood, the last thing I’d said threw her off.

“Coolest hero powers?” She loomed over me in a way that I was pretty sure was unintentional, and-  _ Fuck, what, was that not okay? What did I do wrong? I mean, like, they’re heroes? It’s- _

“It’s not like a personal thing or whatever, it’s- heroes just have less interesting powers usually, because the villains are like- you know? If your power is strong enough you’re less inclined to stick to the law, you can get away with more or whatever, right?”

“I..” She sighed. “Okay, first off, that’s fucking stupid.” I was about to start feeling like shit, but she smiled at me and wrapped an arm around my waist.  _ Huh?  _ “Second off, that’s not what I was asking about.”

“Oh.” I blinked. “Then, what-?”

“Just like, kinda stupid to talk about how we’re cool but then the first thing you mention is our powers. We’re more than that, obviously.” My eyes blinked again, twice, before going wide at the realization of how shitty I was being.

“Oh fuck, I’m sorry. I-”

“Hey.” She squeezed me with her arm, and-  _ Aaaa! _ My thoughts clouded up, but this time not in a dissociative way. “You’re chill. You’re good. Just letting you know you sounded like a little bit of a bitch, okay?” Before I could respond, she planted her lips on my cheek before pulling back and smirking. “Not a big deal. Promise.”

“Okay..” I was shaking somewhat, all of the energy and tension having built up in me so much that it didn’t have a proper way to escape. “Okay.” I leaned on her, my leg bouncing, and kept my hands firmly on the carton to stop it from falling onto the ground. My heart pounded, feeling like it was threatening to melt the ice cream on the spot. My mind was going so  _ slow, _ everything just slightly out of reach, bogged down by flooding emotions, and gay stupid hormone bullshit, and-

_ Oh.  _ The breath in my lungs forced their way out of me in a catastrophic wheeze.  _ Right, yeah, hah! It’s not dissociation, it’s not hormones or love or anything else making me stupid. I’m like this now, I- _ I blinked a few times and held Barb tight, tears racing each other to my ducts.  _ Hahahahaha! Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha! _

Nobody said anything, I just cried like a fucking idiot for a minute or longer, probably ruining Barb’s clothes. Ruining everything, like people like me always did. Scraping by and begging to be capes, begging to be something incredible when we don’t deserve it, and I’d  _ accepted _ that but fuck if this wasn’t different. To be normal was one thing, but to be normal for  _ normal people _ was another. This ‘fog’ I was experiencing was my life now.

“Why’d I give him up?” I choked out between sobs. “Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck!” I gripped my fists tight to stop my claws from tearing at Barb’s top or the sheets or anything like that.  _ Can’t ruin. _ Breathing was so fucking hard, and part of me didn’t even want it to get easier. How nice would it have been to just collapse and be over with it while I still retained some level of power? The idea that it might not be all out of my system - that I could get  _ dumber _ \- reignited my terror.

“Hey!” The yelling got through my own internal and probably external screaming. It wasn’t Barb’s voice, or even Vincent’s.

“Huh?” I sputtered, and tried to compose myself as quickly as I could. Vincent’s dad was at the door. He gave me one look, was taken aback, and turned to the others.

“Sounded like someone’s  _ dying _ in here. Is she alright?”

“She’s having a hard day, but she’s fine,” Barb lied. I corroborated it with an apologetic smile.

“You sure?” He seemed pretty reasonably incredulous.

“Yep. She’ll keep it down, sorry,” she chimed.  _ God she’s good at this. _

“..Alright then. Call me if you need me.”

“Yes, sir.” As soon as he was gone, she relaxed. “Parents love me.”

“Yeah,” I mumbled.

“Well, ‘me’. Real easy to get people to vibe with you, but I don’t like to be fake unless it’s someone like a parent. No use in getting me and my girlfriend thrown out, right?” She patted my back.

“Y.. Yeah.”  _ Would I have gotten us.. thrown out..? _ “I’m s-” I choked on the words, my body still ramped up from a minute earlier. “Sorry.”

“It’s chill, don’t worry about it.” She reached a hand down and lifted me up - I’d apparently fallen off the bed and not realized it. I grabbed it, and she pulled me back up. After a quick look around I found that the ice cream had been carefully placed on the ground at some point during my freakout.  _ Why are you so fucking good at this?  _ “I’m glad, honestly.”

“Huh?” She seemed amused by my confusion. “No, wh- Glad about.. what?”

“You being like, a total fucking mess. I was worried you’d gotten boring without the pedo bitch’s Master shit. Vince was worried too, right Vince?” She gestured over to him, and he shrugged.  _ God, how the fuck is he so  _ chill _ all the time? _

“Oh.”  _ Oh, so I’m not.. boring. Because.. mm. _

“Anyways, yeah, you doing okay now?” I nodded in response, unsure of my own certainty. “Okay. Well, yeah, so what were we saying? Reasons I’m cool?” Again, I nodded. “That’s dumb, let’s talk you.” She draped her arm over my shoulder, making me feel oddly encouraged. The whiplash of the last few moments was enough to make even  _ me _ have a hard time, but Barb and Vincent were rolling with it just fine.

“Mm.. Mm, no, I-”

“Come on, babe.” She stared deep into my eyes, giving me just enough pause that I let my guard down. And then - damned that I didn’t see it coming - she kissed me. And in the aftermath, she looked into me again and smiled, and spoke as if nothing had happened as I melted away. “For me?”

“O-Okay..” I nodded, somewhat pathetically, my mouth hanging slightly open. “Uhh..”

“Anything, babe.” She placed a hand on my cheek and rubbed it with her thumb. How was I supposed to think like this?

“I had a- uh, I.. the other day, I dreamed about.. you in a Ziz fight..?” She stopped, her expression falling flat, and sighed. “I’m sorry, I-”

“Quinn, just..” She sighed again, retracting her hand and scooting back just enough to make some space between us. “Don’t you think about anything other than cape shit? Ever?”

“I..” For the third time in basically no time at all, she sighed.

“Forget it.”

“Wh-”

“No, just.. you’re being weird and.. worshippy, and yuck.” She made a face, displaying her disgust at my actions to the world for all to see. “Just.. Hit me up tonight, or in a couple days, when you’re feeling better.” She pushed herself up off the bed, grabbed the ice cream, and looked down at me. “Okay?”

“..Okay..” How easily I complied only seemed to make her more upset, evidenced by the tone of her voice shifting to even more of a groaning mess.

“Okay. Seeya Vince.” She waved back to him, not caring to look behind herself to see him wave back, and left. Vincent, for all his chill, didn’t seem particularly happy with what had just happened. At least I wasn’t alone in feeling kind of fucked over.

“I..”  _ She took the ice cream. _ A sharp breath left my lips as I flopped onto my back. “I don’t know. What do I even do about that? Like, fuck, I.. I’m trying to turn a new leaf or a.. or something, you know, V? I gave up David, I like.. I fucking, I don’t know. I don’t know. What am I supposed to do about that? I don’t know.”

He didn’t have to say anything for me to realize I was repeating myself. Maybe it was best to take a note from his book and just sit and think for a while. Surprisingly, I didn’t even really have to think about it for long; just taking a moment to catch my breath was enough to sort things out.

“I’m just trying so hard, and I feel like people aren’t appreciating that. Or, worse, they’re judging me for it. I know that who I used to be is like.. I know people  _ miss _ that to some extent, but it was bad. I was bad, and reaching for shit that’s not mine, and it wasn’t okay. I’m just stepping back and being realistic about what I am -  _ who _ I am - and I just figured that was like.. what people wanted. Maybe not consciously, but subconsciously. What people deserved. Maybe she’ll grow to appreciate it? I don’t know, I just-”

My rant was cut off by my phone vibrating. Checking who it was revealed that I’d been texted by Vincent. When I looked at him, he just raised his eyebrows a pinch to convey.. something of value, probably. Something I probably would’ve picked up before. I disregarded that concern and flipped my phone open, checking the text and seeing a short, four word message from him.

_ ‘you’re better than this’ _

“Yeah?” He nodded with that same certainty he always held in his statements. I envied him, and that envy only made my response more genuine than it already would've been. “I’m not so sure about that.”


	3. Rise 6.2 R

Walking through to my room at the Wards HQ, I still couldn’t believe we’d really dealt with David just like that. Weeks of tension and drama, days of planning, and he was just gone. I was happy, certainly, but just so underprepared. All the time leading up to it, and I’d done basically nothing to think of what would happen  _ afterwards. _

“Hey, Riley!” Before I even had time to react, Mortar had landed right in front of me, bouncing somewhat. “Guess what?”

“Uh, what?” The two of us hadn’t talked much at all since the Marshal fight, outside of a bit of small talk when we trained together, so I was taken a bit off guard by her behavior, even though she’d always been fairly friendly when she was in a good mood. That said,  _ I _ wasn’t really in the mood.

“Okay okay okay,  _ so!” _ She took a deep breath, giving me a fraction of a second to prepare for a hyperspeed rant. “The new CCF patch is coming out this week, and with it they’re adding a new DLC that lets you  _ make your own fighter! _ It’s like, totally irrelevant to the competitive scene, since there’s no limits put in place to balance things out, but depending on how advanced the builder is, we could make  _ us! _ Wouldn’t that be amazing?” Her eyes shined up at me in anticipation for my response. I gave her the best feigned excitement I could.

“Yeah! That.. wow!” My fake smile was pretty much instantly seen through.

“Oh, come on.” She pushed me, playfully. “It’ll be  _ so _ cool.”

“No, yeah, I mean.. Yeah, that sounds fun, I’m just.. I don’t know, not as big a fan as you are, I guess, and I’ve got things on my mind. But I’m glad you’re happy.” When I smiled this time it was genuine. Even if we’d not really been particularly close friends, she’d still been pretty good to me outside of that one time I pissed her off.  _ And, I mean, she’s a kid. _

“That’s dumb.”

“Huh? No, I mean, I think it’s a fun series of games-”

“Not that, dummy. You shouldn’t let thinking about sad stuff ruin your excitement for another thing.”

“Ah, I..”  _ Kinda naive? But also, I mean..  _ “I don’t know, I guess? I’m a little worried about a friend, but she’s sorta doing better than ever, so like.. yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“Of course I am, I’m” - she spread her legs out wide and flexed her arms, doing some sorta pose - “Max.. THUUUNNNDDEEEERRRR!”

“Keep it down, Max!” Boon yelled from another room.

“Get bent, nerd!” she yelled back. I couldn’t help but giggle a little bit at her excessive energy. It wasn’t very often that Boon would yell, so he was almost certainly doing something  _ really important, _ but the carefree energy Mortar was radiating was too irresistible. “Okay but seriously we should probably go somewhere else.”

“Oh, uh, okay.” I’d kind of assumed we wouldn’t be talking for much longer. “Like, I don’t know, my room-?”

“Why not your power? I wanna get real good at it.” She beamed at me.

“Good at.. it..?” I tilted my head.

“Yeah, like, handling the blue stuff. You’re good at it, duh, and I’m sure others are getting pretty good at it, but I want to be the best. Other than you, I mean.”

“Oh. Well, I..”  _ What do I even say to that? _ “My power’s not up right now. I just got back from a patrol, so like.. yeah.” Though I was telling the truth, it sure felt like I was lying. I hated that feeling.

“Aw, bummer.” She pouted, making that irrationally-sourced guilt even worse. Thankfully, though, she bounced back pretty quickly. “Welp, guess we’ll just have to do it some time soon.”

“Guess so.” I flashed her an awkward attempt at a friendly smile, hoping it’d be a clear enough indication that I was done with the talk. Thankfully once more, she was also out of things to talk about.

“Alright, well, this was fun! Seeya Shifty girl!” She waved exaggeratedly as she ran off, and I waved back.  _ Weird. _

With that out of the way, I got back to heading towards my room. With luck, I wouldn’t need to shift to ensure a peaceful trip there, but people never seemed to let someone just walk by in this place. The instant they saw someone it was just-

“Oh, Shift.” My teeth grit, my fists clenched, and I firmly closed my eyes.

“Yes, Jaunt?” With  _ luck, _ he would get from my aggressive tone of voice that I was  _ not interested. _ But fuck me, he was walking my way.

“I’ve been thinking about things for a little bit, and I was wondering if we could talk? You’re a good listener, and I thought you’d maybe be able to help with this.”

“How long will it be?”

“Not too long, promise.” I sighed, forcing myself to release the tension in my body; he wasn’t taking the hint, so there was no point to it, and I was already kinda sore.

“Okay.”  _ Let’s just get this over with, I have nowhere to be. _ “The lounge?” I was already making my way over there when I asked, since that was where these talks always happened, enough that I’d begun to think of it as a torture chamber.  _ Willy was better than this. _

“Actually,” he stopped me, “I was hoping we could do it in my room?” I wasn’t sure what would be worse between going into  _ his _ room or letting him in  _ mine. _ Neither sounded like something I was even remotely comfortable with, but his was probably better, with no chance of getting his sweat on my stuff.

“..Okay,” I eventually,  _ very _ tentatively replied.

“Okay,” he repeated. Without another word, he was leading me along. His room was fairly close, so we arrived in basically no time, and..  _ Huh. _ It was sort of.. normal? I’d expected something more edgy, or pseudo-intellectual, like a bunch of skulls or a wayward poster of a philosopher. Contrary to all of that, it was just a fairly normal room.

It wasn’t like he hadn’t modified the place at all, because that wouldn’t have countered any of my preconceptions either. No, he’d drifted from the standard layout and made it his own, _ weirdly  _ normal place to hang out. He’d even painted the walls green, which I hadn’t even realized was something you were allowed to do. The only thing that really stood out as possibly being there just for show was his bookshelf, but nothing I saw in a quick skim jumped out at me as just there to make himself look cool, and he  _ was _ a reader..  _ Huh. _

After giving me some time to inspect his room, he sat down in his desk chair and gestured to his bed.  _ I guess he thinks this is polite? Like, sure, maybe it’s comfier, but.. Guh, no, yeah, I guess I’d rather sit where he sleeps than where he games. Or..  _ I had to keep myself from showing my disgust outwardly.  _ If I find any jizz stains I’m getting out of here immediately. _ Once I was relatively settled, he began.

“So, you’re basically my best friend..”  _ Oh god.  _ “And you’re a girl..”  _ Oh  _ god _.  _ Of all the possible things to talk about, he had to go with the worst option. Had I led him on? Was this my fault, that he liked me? I still didn’t even understand why Marion had a crush on me.  _ Is that still a thing? _ Fuck, it didn’t matter right now, I had to focus on- “I was wondering.. how you figured that out..?”

“Huh?” In the shock, I looked over him. His composition was a lot more vulnerable than I was expecting. I felt some of the tension in my shoulders ease away as I subconsciously mirrored him. He wasn’t asking me out, he was-  _ Don’t jump to conclusions, and don’t let your guard down.  _ “Like.. What? Like how I realized I’m a girl?”

“..Yeah,” he meeped out.

“Uhhh..” _Oh my fucking god, what is happening? What is this? Is this some creepy chaser shit or some like.. like, fuck, I don’t- guhhh. Why me? Why fucking me?_ _Just.. get this over with. My shift should be back soon in case I need it._ “Well, it was sort of always in the back of my mind, I guess? And then my trigger made me think about it, I don’t know. I thought I already told you about this?”

“I don’t believe so, no, and I guess I’m just curious what exactly that thought process was like.”

“Right. Uh..” I sighed. “I don’t know? I just realized that if the distress of being called- I don’t know, like..”  _ Come on, just say ‘I do not want to share this with you.’ Easy, just.. _ “I just figured if being called that shit hurt so much that I should try to figure out why, because it was worse than the other names. It was always worse, in that it kinda ached? It was invasive on a level beyond what the rest felt like. And, in some ways, it kinda felt nice sometimes? I don’t know.

“Ultimately, I just sort of like.. I guess I just examined myself and what I want in life, and I realized I wasn’t getting that, and I.. And I thought about it, I imagined life as a girl, and- I mean, fuck, it still sucked, but it was better? It felt  _ right, _ I guess, in a way I’d never experienced. It felt like.. I don’t know, like for the first time ever there was a  _ chance _ at something being okay. Because, I didn’t realize it before, but even with how much messier my life is now, I was  _ miserable. _ I hated my life, and.. and now it’s a lot better.”

In the aftermath of infodumping a bunch of deep personal shit I’d only told one other person, with us sort of awkwardly looking at one another, I felt.. oddly fine. It seemed that I’d grown to feel somewhat trusting of Jaunt, with how much of his  _ own _ personal shit he’d told me. And, beyond that, he still looked really,  _ really  _ vulnerable. More so, now, like I’d shot his puppy. I’d barely ever seen  _ Quinn _ looking like this a few times, with an extra decade of history.

“Are you..”  _ What do I even do when someone’s like this? I can’t just like hug him and tell him it’s going to be alright. I guess just.. _ “Are you okay..?”

“I..” His eyes fogged up, but before tears could fully form, he inhaled deeply and forced himself to be tough. It was clear he knew he wasn’t fooling anybody, but something in him forced him to continue on. “Of course,” he choked out. “I’m fine.” The lie sat in the air and rotted with rapid haste, bringing back my awareness of how uncomfortable this situation was, and  _ where _ exactly I was.

“Okay..” I certainly wasn’t helping make things any less awful, but that burden wasn’t really mine to bear. This  _ whole _ thing was his fault, and..  _ God, I just don’t know how to talk to boys. And, worse, I don’t even know if- Like, this is pretty fucking egg-like, right? There’s no way it’s just me who’s seeing this. Or, like, it objectively is just me who’s seeing it, but if  _ others _ saw it, they’d see it. Right? _

“Okay,” he eventually echoed back at me. Watching him flop around like this was painful, both because of secondhand embarrassment, but also just because of how familiar it was. He was so..  _ pathetic. _ That wasn't really anything new, though. Trans or not, Jaunt was sort of just awful in his current state.

“Okay,” I repeated again. If nothing else, it was his job to guide the rest of this conversation. If he really  _ was _ anything like me, he’d freak out and go into denial at the slightest bit of prodding. Unfortunately for the two of us - but especially me - this meant we were stuck looking at each other in silence for a while. Mercifully, the ‘while’ didn’t last long enough for my head to explode.

“So, uh.. How does it.. work?”

“How does- How does  _ what _ work?”

“Becoming..” He stopped, then leaned in just a bit, speaking in a hushed voice that wasn’t actually much quieter than before. “Becoming a girl.”

“Ah, uh..” I shrugged. “I mean, like.. Like what in specific?”

“Like.. All of it?”

“Alright, uh.. I mean, first you come out to family or whatever, obviously.” He  _ really _ seemed to hate that idea, judging by the emotion he was trying and failing to hide. Of course, with my ineptitude, I couldn’t actually tell what exactly he was feeling. “Uh, and then like.. You get put on hormones for a while.”

“How long..?”

“Uhh..”  _ Fuck, okay, just.. You’ve researched this shit, you know how it works normally. Just parrot that. _ “Usually effects can take up to three years to really finalize, with most of the stuff happening in the first year, but then you either keep doing that forever or like.. get surgery, I guess.”

“Three years..” Once again, he was trying hard to hide what he was feeling, but this time I could distinctly recognize it as disappointment. “And.. Mm, are you going to?”

“Going?” I was stalling, and for the first time in my life I was glad I was stupid enough for this kind of feigned ignorance to be immediately accepted as real.

“Going to get surgery, I mean.”

“Oh, uh..”  _ Why did I have to fuck myself over so badly? I need to come up with a good set of lies if I want to avoid this shit exploding in my face. But, for now, just.. _ “I don’t know, I haven’t really thought that far ahead.”

“Ah.” He considered that for a moment, before a realization hit him. “Mm, sorry for pressing for those sorts of details. I can imagine that being.. personal.”

“No, it’s okay. You’ve shared a lot more.”  _ And also I’m lying! Oh boy am I digging some holes! How the fuck does Quinn do this so easily, without freaking out the whole way down? _

“Well, you know.. You’re..” He sighed, wistfully staring down at the ground. “You’re my best friend..”

“Mm..” That reality had come to seem far more depressing than creepy; enough so that I was willing to take a risk. Leaning forward, I placed my hand on his shoulder, and lowered my head a bit to be closer to level with him. “I’m.. here for you.”

The sentiment took ages for him to process - the mental gears churning at an  _ achingly _ slow pace. This kid had clearly been without real love for a  _ really _ long time. I couldn’t exactly blame anyone, but..  _ He could’ve been me. _

And then, he reached up and hugged me. And, despite myself, I hugged him back. I even tried my best to pretend I didn’t hear him crying, and rubbed his back in the way I’d grown accustomed to doing with Quinn. His frame was a lot larger than hers, but the same basic motions still applied. In far more time than it took for Quinn to calm down, he managed to pull himself together, pulling back and wiping his tears with one sleeve. His breathing was remarkably calm in the face of everything.

“Riley..”

“..Yeah?” I’d expected more, but none had come.

“I don’t know how you do it.. I..” He clenched his fists and forcefully kept his eyes closed, fighting back a strong desire to back down. “I want to be strong like you. Please..” He choked on his words, swallowed, and continued. “Can you help me figure out what to do?”

She didn’t need to say any more - I understood entirely. On some level, I’d known for the entire talk, even if I’d been leaving room for something else. Something about how she was acting, and how she held herself, and how she  _ cried _ was far too familiar to be anything else. Ultimately, I knew it was something only I could help with. If I didn’t step up, no one would.

“Of course.” I nodded as sincerely as I could. “Where do you wanna start?”

* * *

Time had passed, conversations had, and conclusions come to, but there was one issue in the back of my mind that had bothered me the entire time. For her sake, I’d wanted to leave it up to her to bring it up, but that hadn’t happened, and it needed to be addressed.

“So.. What are you thinking in terms of.. cape stuff?”

“Huh?”

“Like.. I joined as a girl? But, I mean.. The way I see it, there’s.. Either you come out to the whole world as one of the first openly trans superheroes, you pretend to be a boy when in costume, or you.. I guess you could hypothetically move away to some other town and introduce yourself as a girl, and hope people don’t connect the new you to.. you know?”

“Ah..” She put her face in her hands and groaned despondently. We’d gotten to a decently satisfying point, and I’d basically ruined all of that in less than a minute. “Fuck.”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck!” she yelled.

“Yeah..” She pushed her fingers in and dragged them down just a bit, making red marks on her forehead. Then, she pushed her hands back up before dropping them to her sides and limply hanging over herself in her chair. “I’m sorry.” She hadn’t given me a new name, otherwise I would’ve called her that for reassurance. “We’ll figure it out, okay?”

“Muhhh..” She slumped down even further, sighing and drooping down onto the floor. “This is awful.”

“Yeah, it really is.”

“Blughhhhh..”

“But..” I got up off my chair and bent down at my knees, resting on the balls of my feet, and looked down at her, tilting my head to be sort of parallel to her. “It gets better, I think.”

“Yeah, but it’s not better  _ now.” _ That was a feeling I’d gotten all too familiar with. Holding it back for her benefit was hard, but I tried my best.

“Sure, but now that you know this, you can start heading towards that better. There’s like.. here..” I plopped down and sat cross-legged. “Every day dealing with this has been hard, alright? Really hard. But it’s a different kind of hard from what I experienced before. I was a lot more closed off from myself, I denied myself the room to exist in the way I am, and to think the way that I naturally do.

“Now, though, I’m free to do that stuff. Like, god, I can’t even begin to count how many hours- fuck,  _ days _ I’ve spent in the blue just like..  _ thinking. _ Enough that I have trouble remembering I’ve only had my powers for a little over a month. Enough that twenty-four hour days feel terribly rushed.” I laughed, mostly to push away just how bad of a problem that actually was from my mind, and she smiled back at me in a way that seemed at least a little bit genuine.

“But, anyways, just.. I couldn’t have done that before. On a literal level, obviously, but I mean beyond that. I couldn’t have been real with myself like I’m able to be now. When you stop blocking out something so big like this, there’s sorta this flood that comes with it of stuff you didn’t want to think about before. And some of it’s sad or weird or whatever, but a lot of it is  _ really _ good to let out. You know?”

“Mm..” She took a moment to consider my words, then sat herself upright, using the chair as a backrest. “Bleh..”

“..Yeah.” Sometimes there wasn’t much more that could be said. Sometimes life was just bleh, and all you could really do was sit on the floor with someone who understood. And then sometimes..

* * *

Sometimes life was a whole lot more. For instance, sometimes it was climbing your way up a deck of cards that had been thrown into the air and trying to beat your fastest record for the approval of your sorta boss. Sometimes it was accidentally punching a teammate and sorta friend in the face in the middle of training, with a shocking absence of social repercussions. And, when things got really wild, sometimes life was lying to everyone you know about your magic gender euphoria.

The worst of the people I’d lied to was Jaunt - a reality I’d still barely been able to accept after four days.  _ Or sorta five or six, counting time in the blue. _ She still hadn’t picked a new name, and I wasn’t going to call her Michael, so Jaunt was the best I had. It was the least I could do, all things considered. Hiding my Red Iron payment from her made me feel like a total piece of shit, and..

_ God, I just fucking suck at helping people.  _ It was something I’d always known, since I’d never really had the chance to learn how to support anyone but specifically Quinn, but it was never more apparent than now. I was basically nothing other than a shoulder to cry on - metaphorically, of course, since she rarely actually opened up to that level - and that was  _ fine, _ but it sure wasn’t amazing.

I sighed, which quickly turned into a necessary exhale as I forcefully hopped out of bed, landing on my feet. The motion had become basically effortless at this point; just one of many routines I’d picked up  _ ‘faster than most others’. _ There was little doubt in my mind that Willy was just lying to me in an attempt to make me feel more inspired or something, which was.. a thing, I guessed, but it wasn’t needed. I was plenty motivated, for better or for worse.

_ Today’s the day, after all. _ I quickly set to getting everything set up. Once the door to my room was partly opened, my Blueline costume was draping off of one shoulder, and my hand was placed on the front door of my home, I took a deep breath and shifted in. Immediately, I began changing into my costume before going over and tossing my civilian clothes into my room. Then, I went back to and through the front door, locked it, and started walking.

_ Oh, wait, I could’ve just gotten changed and hopped out a window or something. Whoops. Then again, this way makes it easier to avoid looking at my body. _ Even with the week’s changes, I was still not particularly happy about how I looked.  _ But, again, today’s the day. _

I wasn’t entirely sure why I felt the need to do it around Willy, but it just seemed right. She was the reason I had the pills, so it just made sense on some level that I would take them when she could see. She seemed to be happy about how happy I was, and she was.. kinda cool? I still couldn’t believe that I’d become sorta-friends with a murderer, but..  _ She’s not like that; there’s other elements at play which make it an okay thing. _ That’s what I tried to tell myself, at least, even if part of me wanted to think of things in black and white.

_ Hopefully she’s in when I get there. _ We had a system in place for me to communicate with her once I arrived, but there was a chance of her being too busy to come over. Even in the cases where she’d had the time, the trip still took longer than I would’ve liked. Sitting silently in the middle of a maze of cardboard wasn’t exactly the most fun, even if it gave me time to think. I didn’t really appreciate being  _ forced _ to think about my problems.

Another thing I’d come to realize was that the lack of stillness in the environment around me made it harder to think. In the blue, everything was completely and totally silent and motionless except for me, and I’d gotten so used to that being where I thought about deep things that it had gotten sorta difficult to not get distracted by even the slightest of breezes, or the hum of a light. Of course, my ADHD probably wasn’t helping things whatsoever.

I eventually arrived at the building, shifting out so I could enter, and called out. There was no response, to my dismay, so I searched for the communicator - I could never remember exactly where it was in the sea of brown - and sent out a ping. Within a minute, I got an affirmative response.  _ Now I just have to wait. _

So, I did. And, as expected, it sucked. I couldn’t  _ really  _ think, and I had nothing to distract me, so it was just twenty or so minutes of waiting around being extremely bored. I knew  _ why _ I couldn’t bring my phone with me when coming here, but it sure would’ve been nice. For every wonderful part of this arrangement, there was something just as awful making me regret it.

More than a few times, I’d been tempted to just run off with the pills and get Willy and her team thrown in jail, but there were so many reasons why that was a terrible idea. Most easily internalized was just the fact that I couldn’t know she’d actually be detained, and she could easily retaliate. She knew my name, where I lived, and could easily find out who mattered to me.

But, of course, the most  _ important _ factor was that if I  _ did _ manage to get the Red Iron shut down, who could say what would pop up as a result? Though I didn’t fully understand it, I knew that they were actively suppressing many of the evils in the city. I just couldn’t really wrap my head around it, or use it as compelling evidence to myself for why I shouldn’t make a decision, so I had to rely entirely on that personal fear. It made me feel irrational, and kinda pathetic.

Thankfully, I was eventually freed from my pit of half-baked self pity by Willy’s arrival. She didn’t say anything, upon coming in, so I didn’t either. Soon enough, though, she’d found me.

“Hi, sweetie,” she cooed, taking off her coat and draping it over a chair. I blinked, and a slight blush reached my cheeks. For weeks, now, she’d been calling me dear, but never  _ sweetie. _ Maybe I was just being stupid, but it seemed like a step up, and I wasn’t really sure how to respond. And, beyond that, I was pretty sure the last time I’d been called that was by my  _ mom,  _ which..  _ Guh. _

“Um, hi,” I responded, timidly. I rubbed my thumb over the pill holder to try to calm myself down somewhat.

“Got here as soon as I could. Bikers are dreadful, wouldn’t you agree?” She sat down cross-legged in the chair, leaning against the fabric of her coat, and placed her hands on her thighs with the fingers splayed out. “Anyways, how are you?”

“I’m-”  _ Intimidated. _ “I’m okay, I guess.” I placed my hands very consciously on my own lap, holding each other, and tried not to idly fiddle with the box.

“Good, I’m glad. Things have been a bit hectic this last week, in preparation for the mission.”

“Right! Yeah, big mission.”

“I never told you about it, dear.”

“Oh.” I swallowed. “Right.”

“We’re planning a strike against the Aviary. Payback, to some extent, for stealing Blank away from us.” My recent thoughts about being retaliated against flashed back into my mind, but I pushed them aside. “Hopefully it will also serve as a way of getting her back. The very fact that I still know our history together is testament enough to her unwillingness to give me up. I’ll ideally find out  _ why _ she left, and can have Eagle and Vulture out of the picture for the foreseeable future.

“But, ah,” she interrupted herself, adjusting her position into something that felt better suited for listening, though I couldn’t put my finger on why. “You called me here, not the other way around. What is it you were needing? We aren’t scheduled to train again until Sunday.”

“Oh, uh.. I just thought it’d be nice if I-” I held up the box, though she’d already noticed it. “I thought you might like to see me.. take these, every week? Um, I can’t really remember why I thought that’d be a good idea, but like maybe it’s.. uh..”

“Calm, dear,” she asserted. “Yes, it’d be nice. I may not be able to make it every week, but when I can, I’m always interested in seeing you happy.” She smiled at me in that way I was sorta growing familiar with, and I smiled back as best as I could. “Speaking of - have things been working alright the past week? You look.. softer, maybe, though that could just be my imagination.”

“Yeah.” It wasn’t really something you could see when I was in costume, or at least I hadn’t thought so, but ‘softer’ was pretty accurate. “It’s been nice, it’s.. Almost surreal. It’s like, there’s this thing that happened and now every day I can like.. It’s not big changes, but I can see slight shifts from when I wake up to when I go to sleep, and then wake up again. I think my mind’s probably exaggerating them to some degree, but it’s.. it’s nice, it’s just weird. I like it.”

“Well,” she said, after taking a short moment to make sure I was finished, “I’m glad you’re satisfied so far. Your wellbeing is very important to me.”

“Mm..” I still didn’t really understand  _ why _ I was so important. Apparently just from the moment she first saw me, she knew I was perfect for this job, but that was one of the few things she’d said that I was fairly certain was a lie. What about me, let alone something detectable  _ on sight, _ was so unique? What made me worth putting this much energy into? If Willy had met Quinn, would the same thing have happened? They had more in common, at the very least, and..  _ If you met Quinn  _ now, _ would you even still want me? _

I guessed I was happier now more than ever that Quinn had sorta given up on her quest to be a cape, at least for the time being. Not that I wasn’t before, of course, but I needed this. Without Willy having some bizarre interest in me specifically, I wasn’t sure where I’d be in life. How had a villain made such a hugely beneficial impact on my life in so little time? How had-  _ Wait, shit, I’m still not alone. _

“Ah, uh,” I stammered. “Sorry, I.. got distracted. Sorry.”

“It’s quite alright - I have time. You’re cute when you’re thinking.”

“Mm..” I found myself once again blushing, and I felt a little less stupid about it this time. “Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me just for being honest, dear.”

“Hah, uh, right. Right.”  _ I still don’t understand why, but I guess it doesn’t matter. _ “Anyways, right, the..” I held up the box. “This, yes.”

“Yes,” she echoed.

“I guess I just..” Clicking open the latch, I picked out one of the identical purple pills.  _ The purple ones are the right ones, right? _ With a quick count - one I would have done with my power had it been available - I determined that there was one less purple than pink, and from there that I had the right one, since they’d been even before. “Mm, bottom’s up I guess.”

Once more, the pill slid down my throat effortlessly and exploded into-  _ Mmnph, fuck. _ My head fogged up, my brain being just barely out of reach, and I just.. floated. Nothing during the rest of the week compared to  _ this. _

“God,” I might have said. I couldn’t really tell if I was saying anything or just mumbling incoherently, and I kinda didn’t care. My grip on the chair was desperately tight, and I was bleeding-  _ No. _ I felt like I was bleeding, but it was just the high, or whatever it’d be called. The haze, and the.. and the.. “Have you ever felt.. alive..?”

“Hmm?” She giggled, softly, under her breath. “Yes, I suppose I have.”

“I feel..  _ very.. _ that. I knew this was.. coming, kinda..? But it’s-” My sentence had to be cut short by a wave of.. something? “What even is it that.. I mean, that makes this feel like this in the.. in the pills..?”

“No idea, dear, but I’m glad you’re enjoying it.”

‘Enjoying it’ was a bit of an understatement, but rather than focus on correcting her I just let myself ride the high. My whole body felt fuzzy, with little bursts of what I could only describe as a very wonderful light yellow. All over, I could feel tiny, little changes, and..

“Ow.” It wasn’t a  _ lot _ of pain, but any was a lot more than what had previously been nothing but pleasure. It had been a very weird and alien pleasure, but still pleasure.

“Ow?”

“Yeah,” I groaned. “Ache.” If it were possible to give your chest a workout, this would be what the day after felt like. “I’m.. fine.” I shifted around in my seat, trying not to come off as  _ too _ uncomfortable, and looked down. Part of me was expecting to see massive growth, but I didn’t see any difference. Of course, it had only been a few minutes, so I had to be patient. “Uh, anyways, tell me about the Aviary thing.”

“Oh.” She tilted her head slightly to the right to get a better look at my face. “Are you sure?”

“Uh-huh.”  _ Just need a distraction and this will be fine. _

“Well, if you say so.” She shuffled about for a moment, ending up with one leg over the other, and leaned towards me. “The strike is taking place on the second of December - the Wednesday after next, and-”

“Wait, the second?”

“..Yes?” I wasn’t supposed to interrupt her, but she let it slide with little more than a disapproving look.

“Um, that’s the day of..”  _ No, okay, there’s no way something like that will last into the next day, and even if it somehow  _ does, _ it’s not like I’m going to be part of it. There’s no way this gets in the way of Quinn’s birthday, it’s- _ “Nothing, I’m fine.” She gave me a perplexed look, so I tried to wave it off. “No, I- Just.. Sorry, continue. Please.” Out of either politeness or a lack of care, she went along with my request.

“..So we’re making our attack in a week and a half..” She paused, in case I wanted to say anything. I gave her a thumbs up and an awkward smile, and just hoped she wasn’t holding any sort of silent grudge over my stepping out of line. It didn’t help that I was still a little flighty from the pills. “Alright. So, you will not play any part in the actual mission, but I’m going to be seeking your assistance in preparation over the next week.

“Above all else, your job will be delivery of equipment the day before. You’ll be outfitted with - and I understand the irony after my earlier comment - a bike. I considered a car, but I’m not sure that would be feasible given the limitations of your power, and I also am not sure if you even know how to drive.”

“I don’t.”

“That’s what I figured.” Though it was an absolutely reasonable and correct conclusion to come to, something about how she said it felt judgey.  _ It’s probably just in your head, chill. _ “So, you’ll be biking some of Forge’s tech to three locations and hiding them in areas I designate. We can’t afford to have the equipment found beforehand, which is why it’s vital that you only turn off your power once you’re far away from each delivery point. I’ll remind you of this when the time comes, of course, but it’s something you should work on internalizing now.”

“Will do.” It was nice of her to put so much effort into overcoming the places my ADHD made it harder for me to work. Some of my teachers had done the same thing, but none of them had gone the extra step that she had in using the strengths the disorder gave me to our advantage. Hyperfocusing could be sorta like a superpower, at times, and she was pretty good at getting those times to happen when she wanted them to.

“Good. Before that, I’ll just be asking you to complete a few small tasks. Nothing particularly worth bringing up ahead of time, though I can give you a summary if you’d like.”

“Uhh..” I blinked, letting my eyes stay closed for a fraction of a second longer than normal. My head was still a little fuzzy. “Uh, if you don’t mind, I think I would.”

“Mm.” She smiled and reached over, pulling down my hood and rubbing my hair for a brief moment, before taking her hand back. “Of course, dear.” Mixed with the effects of the pill, I was pretty helpless to do anything but stupidly stare and feel kinda good about myself. “Now, where to start?”


	4. 6.3 - 7.3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm done. This is the rest of what I had written. The last couple chapters aren't edited or proofread.

**Fade - Rise 6.3**

I still couldn’t believe more than a week had gone by since David had been dealt with. I was still getting used to just how bland my life felt these days, but I didn’t really mind anymore, since it gave me some time to breathe. Hallucinations were the biggest issue, but I was handling them alright. Anyone who didn’t know me probably wouldn’t have been able to tell any difference.

The issues came with those who knew me, but didn’t know what was going on in my life. Most notably, and most dangerously, was Sandra. The exact details of what was up with David hadn’t been revealed to the public, or even much beyond the fact that he had been doing  _ something _ illegal, but Sandra in particular had her theories. I’d dismissed it at first, due to the reckless and tunnel visioned headspace I was in, but David had absolutely been correct in how terribly I’d handled things.

Our groups had still been sitting together at lunch, but things had been quieter between all six of us. Everyone knew that everyone else was uncomfortable, and that only added to the tension. This arrangement had stayed true even after the weekend, all the way up until Sandra asked me if we could talk alone.

“Oh.” I looked up from my sludge, checking her body language to make sure I hadn’t just imagined the request.  _ All good. _ “Uh, yeah.” She immediately stood up, at which I did the same. “Right now, got it.” I didn’t really mind the excuse to skip the last half of what public schooling counted as a meal.

“Girls, stay,” Sandra ordered. Marissa obediently nodded, homemade spaghetti in her mouth, while Beth rolled her eyes. That seemed good enough, because we were off. Before I got too far from the table, I waved to Riley to let her know I was okay. With that out of the way, we walked all the way to the girls’ bathroom, which put me a little on edge; there were  _ far _ too many ways to fuck with someone in a public bathroom, and even more reasons to want to do that to me.

“So,” I said, hoping to cut into the tension somewhat.

“So,” she echoed, turning to face me. We’d only just barely entered the room, so she was pinning me between her and the door. If it was a conscious decision on her part, it was a pretty dumb one, since I could  _ easily _ just run out from where we’d just come in. Sandra wasn’t  _ stupid, _ really, so it seemed to just be an unfortunate incident with no real malice behind it.

“So,” I said once more, since she hadn’t continued. She sighed.

“I know what you did.”

“Yeah?” If I hadn’t already been expecting this, my heart would’ve skipped a few dozen beats. Still, it had some effect on me. My throat had tightened a bit, making my voice sound kind of like a dying frog.

“I’m not mad.”  _ But..? _ “I mean, I’m furious, but I..” She grit her teeth and clenched one fist. “I wish I’d had the chance to tear his fucking face off, if we’re going to be honest about things.  _ But..” _ She took a small step back to give me more room to breathe. “I don’t blame  _ you _ for what happened.”

“No?”  _ She’s deluded herself into thinking I was acting under his control, or- _

“No, Quinn, because I was.. awful. I played just as much part in you doing the thing you did as David. Don’t get me wrong, it’s  _ horrifically  _ invasive, and I’m.. shocked is a good word for it, I think. I was  _ surprised _ to find that I had been impacting you so much, that you were willing to go to such lengths to fuck me over, but.. I mean, you didn’t, did you? My life is better than it ever had been, and..” She frowned. “It’s complicated, basically, but I’m not mad.”

“Ah.” What else could I say?  _ Nothing _ about this was okay - I saw that now - but I’d worked so hard to make her someone who would be complicit in this that she was just..  _ fine, _ like a fucking brainwashed slave, or-

“You owe me big, though, for not dunking your head into one of these toilets.”  _ Oh. _ Maybe I hadn’t done as much damage as I’d feared.

“Big as in what?”

“You have powers?”

“Uh..” The question was so out of left field, I almost thought I’d hallucinated it. “I mean, no, but.. where did that come from?”

“You really think I’m going to believe that  _ you  _ were the only one David trusted with his secret without something else sweetening the pot?”

“No. I mean, I.. No, we were friends, and he confided in me.”

“That’s bullshit.” She stepped forward again, and years of conditioning made me step back, but I managed to stop myself halfway, ending with one leg behind the other. “You’re not enough of a suckup to get a guy like him to actually  _ care _ about you.”

“What would you know of what kind of guy he is?” I nearly let the word ‘dumbass’ slip out at the end, but that would’ve been a terrible idea. “He wasn’t some heartless villain, okay? He wanted me to succeed, because we were friends.”

“Then why’d you turn him in?” She didn’t seem to understand  _ just _ how daunting of a question this was, and I wasn’t in the mood to share. “You’re a lot of things, Quinn, but you’re not the type to stab someone you care about in the back.”

“It-”  _ God damn it, just comply. She’s right, I owe her this much, and it’ll get her off my ass. _ I sighed and tried to ease some of the tension in my body. “He wanted me to succeed, and he was pulling the strings for years, and.. he told me, and I freaked out because  _ of course  _ I did, and.. and he used his power on me, tried to sedate me.

“I was able to break out of it, because I knew what was going on, and I think in part because of some other stuff he did. And then I blackmailed him, and used him. I was just doing what he’d been doing for me, really, but with a lot less forethought. Like, what I did with you wasn’t exactly  _ subtle. _ And..” I thought about Barb, for apparently long enough for Sandra to think I was done.

“And?”

“Guh, just, people objected for obvious reasons. None more than my..”  _ Now is not the right time to give Sandra the satisfaction of knowing she was right all along about my sexuality. _ “I’ve been dating someone, and that’s where I got the most objections. Made me realize how awful what I was doing was, and so I.. It took a lot longer than I’m proud of, but I did what I had to.”

“Damn.”  _ You don’t know the half of it. _ “Can’t believe you hid a boyfriend from me.” I blinked. “Is it Vincent?”

“Wh-  _ That’s _ what you took from all of that?”

“Hey hey, don’t try to change the topic on me, Kelly.” She was grinning playfully, as if I hadn’t just dropped weeks worth of stress onto her.  _ Deflecting? _ “It’s Vincent, right?”

“It’s not Vincent, oh my god!” I huffed exaggeratedly, a smile of my own creeping up. Despite the roots of our friendship being so fake, we  _ did _ get along pretty well. “Not anyone who goes here.”

“Ooh, exotic,” she joked. “Well, you’ve confessed enough of your dark secrets today, so I’ll let this one sit for now. Just know, I  _ will _ find out who he is some day, and when I do I’ll tell him what an aggro bitch you are.” The fact that she was saying this shit in any tone other than deathly serious was still  _ incredibly _ surreal.

“Yeah, yeah..” Surreal and pleasant was better than before, I guessed. “Okay, we should probably head back before the bell rings - Mr. Anderson’s going to be pissed if I’m late again.”

“Sure thing, teacher’s pet.”

I rolled my eyes, leaving the bathroom feeling a lot better than when I’d gone in, which checked out based on how bathrooms tended to work. I just had three more classes before the day ended, and Riley didn’t have anywhere to be, so we’d get to hang out a little bit. It was nice to have ‘chill time with Riley’ back as the highlight of my week. We deserved that.

* * *

Those plans got thoroughly fucked up when I spotted my dad while waiting outside for Riley. Part of me was freaked and struggled to think, but another part immediately knew I would fare better if I approached him now than if I waited for him to inevitably come to the Greens’ house. People acted differently in public, and I could use that to my advantage.

“Dad, hey!” I called out after the first few steps. He turned to find where my voice was coming from, saw me, and helped close the gap. The instant I was within arms reach, he seized mine. In an instant, all of the cocky, powerful confidence I’d been feeling went away, and I was just a stupid, panicked girl again.

“Come. We’re going home, now.”

“No, I-” His grip tightened, tearing down to my bones, and tugged. I stumbled forward, and in a split second decision I fought off my natural instinct to stabilize and let myself fall to the ground, right in the middle of the small crowd. Someone nearly got knocked down with me, and a couple others got pushed around as well, but what I noticed more than anything else was how fucking bad my knees hurt. Was I bleeding?

It didn’t matter, because at least he wasn’t touching me anymore.

Sucking up the pain and fighting the fear, I pushed myself to my feet one leg at a time. All things considered, the amount of people who were at all concerned was pretty minimal - being mostly just those whose days I’d interrupted. None of them seemed to care about anything other than if anyone had just gotten hurt, completely ignoring the disgusting way my dad was looking at me. I had to go bigger.

“This man is a fucking creep!” I shouted, pointing at him. This time I got their attention. “He hits me, and he hit my mom too! He threw an empty beer bottle at me once, and it would’ve hit me if I hadn’t closed my door fast enough! And he doesn’t feed me! And he..” At this point, people were staring, but their eyes were on  _ me _ rather than  _ him. _ I simply trailed off, unable to find anything else to say, so Dad spoke over me.

“Sorry,” he said, addressing the crowd, “about my daughter’s disruption.” He concluded his point by staring down at me with the most exhausted look I’d ever seen, trying to make himself seem like just the poor parent of a lying teenage brat. It was almost enough to convince them on its own, but one comment cemented his victory.

“Shut the fuck up, Quinn.” My heart sunk. I didn’t see who said it, but everyone seemed to be in agreement, and those who didn’t just didn’t give a shit. Who the fuck would believe  _ me _ of all people? All the shit he did - it was just easier for them to pretend I must be exaggerating in some twisted form of exhibitionism. That’s what they all saw me as anyways, wasn’t it? I was just a crazy attention whore to them. No one was on my side. Why would they be?

He grabbed onto my hand, far more gently but still tight enough that I couldn’t easily break out, and started walking. And, as everyone went back to what they were doing, little more than exasperated and annoyed, I submitted. Trudging along behind him at the pace he decided, I accepted my fate. With how long we walked, I realized he hadn’t driven over. He wanted me to  _ suffer _ as he dragged me all the way home. He wanted me to-

“Hey, Grant.” In the blink of an eye, Riley was there. Either she’d shifted over, or I was so out of it that I didn’t see her coming over. For the sake of her not risking exposing her secret, I hoped for the latter. We came to a stop, by my dad’s lead, and he grumbled.

“Reynold.” He tightened his grip again, now that there wasn’t anyone around to call him out on it. “Seems like I haven’t seen you since your family stole my daughter away from me.”

“Can you keep a secret?” She was acting so confidently in the face of him, like we hadn’t  _ both _ spent most of our lives terrified of him.

“Excuse me?” 

“Your dad would be disappointed.”  _ Oh god. _

Once the insult was processed, he immediately began moving towards her, snarling and pulling me along. It hurt, him squeezing even harder than before, surely tearing into the skin and crushing me, readying himself to do the same to her, going in to strike and-

In an instant, he lost his grip and stumbled forward, down onto the pavement. Riley, for her part, had just kicked the ass of our lifelong bully in the span of maybe a second. Before I knew it  _ she _ was the one leading me along. He yelled, and we ran, and I flipped him off before he was out of sight. Just like when I’d done this with Barb, I felt  _ free, _ but this time I had to wonder..

_ What happens when no one comes to rescue me? _

* * *

“Okay, so first off, that’s stupid.” Of all of our similarities, Barb’s bluntness was always the most shocking. Before her, nobody had been willing to cut right to the chase like I did, except for Dad on a bad night. Unlike everyone else, she didn’t mess around.

“You’re really hot.”

“What?” She blinked and looked at me like I was an idiot.

“It- Mm, I was just thinking. I like having you around, the way you act works with me a lot, and that’s attractive, or something.”

“Okay, well cool, but shut up.” She emphasized her point with a kiss, then immediately went back to what she was saying. “So  _ anyways, _ it’s fucking stupid to act like you need some hero or whatever to save you. When you and I bolted,  _ you’re _ the one who pushed the fucker to the ground.”

“Oh yeah.”

“And like, fuck, you’re a lot stronger now than you were, you’ve been working out, so he’d be no match.”

“Huh.”  _ I guess she’s right. Don’t have to be a cape to fight back. Just have to.. hope I don’t freeze up, I guess. _

“Anyways, what’re you having?”

“Oh.” I hadn’t even realized, with all the talking and kissing and just general being gay, but we’d arrived. “Uh.. Soft taco, I guess?”

“Coolio.” She walked up to the food truck and began reciting our order. I’d never actually eaten at one of these places before, but Barb had insisted that this one was, in her words, ‘good as fuck, babe’. Once the order was placed, we sat down at a nearby table, and I tried to ignore the looks we were getting from the  _ other _ food trucks. I had no idea why they would all be so close to each other. Sure, they all sold different stuff, but it still felt like if two pizza places set up shop on the same street. I didn’t want anything to do with their weird competition.

_ Now that I think about it, who the fuck put these tables here? Did they all pitch in, or if I went and looked closely at every one of the trucks, would one of them have ‘I provided the tables and chairs!’ on their sign? I don’t fucking know, that’s stupid. Not to mention like, I don’t know, I know it doesn’t rain here basically ever but why are these places open when it’s almost December? Wait. _

“Fuck, Barb, it’s almost December.”

“Sure is.” She was sitting back in her chair, arms behind her head and feet on the table. 

“Which, like.. my birthday’s in a  _ week, _ holy shit. Time flies I guess.”

“I’m not getting you anything.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yup.” I didn’t expect her to, of course, since we’d only been together for around a month. However - as tended to be the case with her - she had some other, more cynical reasoning behind her decision. “Mandatory presents blow. If I’m getting you a present, it’s going to be because I’m in the mood to. Anything else is stupid fake bullshit.”

“What if you want to get me a present on the day of my birthday?”

“Then I’ll cuddle you and wait a week so you have time to recover from all the stupid fake bullshit. No point in giving you the thing if you’re going to be numb to it from present oversaturation. It’s like offering someone food right after they finished eating a cake: even if that food is the best god damn steak of their life, they’re not going to properly appreciate it.”

“Mm, yeah, I guess.”

“And, speaking of..” She scooted a little bit, positioning herself to get out of the chair, and waited. The timing wasn’t perfect, but a couple seconds later the guy called her name, and she went over to pick up our food. Shortly after, she came back and put it down on the table, but..

“I only ordered one.”

“Yeah, it’s a present. Second one’s on me, free of charge.” With that, she sat back down and took a bite of her own meal. I couldn’t focus enough to even tell what it was out of the corner of my eyes.

“Can- Mm..” Staring at the extra, my heart sank at the realization that she wasn’t going to let this go. “Can we split it?” I lifted my head up to try to get her to realize this was a big deal for me.

“Nah, but you can save half for later.”  _ I.. guess that’s fair. _ “But hey, you should take a bite before you’re trying to get out of eating the extra. Trust me, you’ll be wishing you had room for more.”

“Alright..” I hesitantly unwrapped one of them, replacing the paper with my hands, and lifted it up to dive in. The tortilla ripped open, along with a variety of things held inside, and  _ god damn _ did I hate how good the ensuing mouthful tasted. I also knew, however, that hating my enjoyment of food was something I needed to work on, so I tried to let myself indulge. “Mmm,” I mumbled after swallowing the first bite. “It’s good.”

“Told you I know best.” She winked to accentuate her comment, before tearing out a huge mass of her-  _ fuck, I don’t know Mexican food words. _ Before tearing out some part of something that was maybe adjacent to an enchilada. “And this shit’s  _ authentic _ as  _ fuck,”  _ she said, chewing several times before swallowing.

Was it stupid that I found it kind of endearing how she never bothered to be polite when eating? Maybe it was just because of how different it was from my behaviors. From what I could tell, it was pretty common to pick up being overly polite as a way to compensate for anorexic shit - to get people to not catch onto what you were doing, and to help deny it to yourself.

“Yeah, it’s- It’s good. Yeah.” Shortly after taking my second bite -  _ mmph, fuck, so good  _ \- Barb was getting up, bringing her food with her.

“Come on, let’s go to the park. There’s one near here.”

“Oh, uh..” I swallowed and gathered my stuff. It was going to be awkward carrying it around, but she had even more to carry, so I felt weird about complaining. “Okay.” With everything collected, we started walking. She was more than willing to eat on the way, but I was too worried about spilling and wasting some of it. Even if this was the one I’d paid for with my own money, it still would’ve felt like I was throwing away her gift if any of it fell to the ground.

“So,” she said, once we were decently far away from anyone else. “Let’s talk about the way you’ve been acting the last week.”

“Huh?” Shortly after I said anything, we had to pause again as we walked past what I assumed to be some weird couple. The slow crawl past them was unbearable, forcing me to wait for what felt like ages to hear criticism of what I thought was a pretty alright change in behavior. Eventually - far later than I would’ve liked - we continued.

“Okay, so don’t get me wrong, I’m super happy you’re like.. doing well or whatever? But you’re sorta acting like, I don’t know, someone’s servant? Mine, more specifically.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, and I mean.. Look, that might be kind of funny with some people, but you’re a hell of a lot more than that to me.”

“Oh,” I repeated. “I.. Mm..” Part of me couldn’t believe she was still eating, even while we talked, but it was certainly something I should’ve come to expect. “I wasn’t trying to do that? To be a servant, or something. I’ve just been like.. I realized that I’d been trying really hard to be something I’m not, and I just stopped. And.. I don’t know, I guess I just am willing to actually stay in my lane now, rather than trying to bust into.. your awesome world.”

“Babe.” She swallowed. “That’s fucking stupid. My world sucks.”

“What? No, your world’s like.. fucking awesome.”

“It’s really not. I mean, fuck, I figured you’d at the very least come to accept that in the last week. That’s like.. Honestly, it kinda seems like you’ve just taken the exact worst lessons from your experiences, which is pretty damn impressive if you ask me.”

“I-”

“Here.” We’d made it to the park, and she’d found a bench for us to sit on that was far away from the few other people around. Again, she resumed eating. My food was probably going to get cold if I didn’t eat it soon, but I didn’t care at the moment.

“Pardon my insensitivity, but I think  _ you _ are wasting some of the most incredible life opportunities anyone can possibly have. You not only get to have powers and shit, but you get to like.. save lives and shit. Fight the bad in the world. Like, fuck, I know the heroes aren’t all sunshine and happy save the day shit - that there’s a  _ lot _ of sketchy shit that needs to be dealt with - but overall you get to be a part of the greatest good we have in this world.”

“That’s..” She groaned, then nudged me with the side of her arm. “Babe, that’s dumb. Don’t be dumb.”

“What? How is that dumb? That’s one of the most realistic takes anyone has ever made about heroes, basically.”

“About  _ adult _ heroes, maybe, but not the Wards; we don’t get to do shit. Even Boon and Partition, who are both going to be joining the Protectorate within a year, don’t get to do  _ anything. _ And, worse, they won’t get to do anything until they’ve been part of the ‘real heroes’ for  _ years. _ It’s fucking stupid, they’re so terrified of any of us getting hurt that they don’t let us actually take on the actual threats, and then an Endbringer or the S9 or whoever the fuck comes and wipes all the inexperienced little kids out.

“Like, I don’t know, I get that villains are evil and fucked up and whatever, but like.. fuck! It’s not like we can just change our minds - like we’re  _ not _ going to be stuck with this life forever. Once you get powers, Quinn, that’s it. You don’t get any other option. And the fucking idiots running the Ward program don’t seem to realize this. Or, worse, they care more about endangerment of children short-term than completely screwing us over in the long run.

“The whole system is fucking  _ garbage, _ Quinn, and.. the way you treat us like we’re better, like we’re some goal to aspire towards, is legitimately the worst thing about you. And, cool, you got rid of the ‘goal to aspire towards’, but the underlying shit is still there. You’re still a fucking  _ annoyingly _ naive bitch who fails to grasp the weight of the world, and-” She sighed, groaning once more. “Sorry, that was a bit much. Haven’t had a great day.”

“Ah, uh..” I awkwardly swallowed some air, hoping her outburst hadn’t drawn anyone’s attention. “It’s.. fine? I don’t mind.”

“Okay, but you shouldn’t be? That’s kind of my entire point, is you’re like.. I mean,  _ guh, _ I  _ like _ that you’re chill now, but you’re also just  _ too _ chill, to the extent that I know this isn’t like.. natural. There’s no way you changed so much in so little time, you know? Unless like-” She cut herself off, sighing and looking away as she took a huge bite.

“Unless everything you liked about me was the result of David fucking with my head?” Actually saying one of my biggest fears out loud took a lot. To make things worse, I wasn’t sure I would’ve had it in me before recent events. Was that because of him, too? Suppression of my willpower? I’d never know exactly what it was he’d been doing to me, and which of my changes going forward would be because of my work, or just because he wasn’t around anymore. None of us would ever get to know.

“Just..” she said, after considering my words as much as I had. “Eat your food, Quinn. I need to think, and.. to finish this before it gets too cold.” She took a bite, and after a few moments, I did the same. The flavor was just as amazing as before, which felt horridly out of place now. Despite knowing I hadn’t really  _ done _ anything, I felt like a piece of shit. Though not explicitly applicable in this case, it wasn’t like that was something I couldn’t be called most of the time.

I hated myself, I’d realized. I always had, but at least I’d been familiar with all my flaws. Now, it was like slowly discovering an entirely new person had replaced someone you’d known, and while they were good in  _ some _ ways, they were worse in most every other possible way, and also really stupid.  _ So,  _ so _ fucking stupid. _

None of the shit in my life was fair. Everyone always said ‘life isn’t fair’, but I knew pretty damn well that they didn’t usually mean it to this extent. Even before I accepted that my life has been pretty severely fucked, I knew I was at least a little bit above the shitty life experience bell curve.

Once I’d stopped comparing myself to capes, it had only been a matter of time I’d realized just how  _ easy _ everyone had it. It was incredibly difficult to keep in mind that the loud minority didn’t represent the majority, let alone to remember that capes were  _ absolutely _ the minority. So much of my day to day had been focused on learning more and more about their lives, that it had barely seemed like there was  _ anyone _ out there like me - people who probably deserved powers, but never managed to get them.

_ Do I deserve them? Do I really? Sure, I’ve been through a lot, but look at what I’ve done with what little access to powers I have. Maybe there’s some sort of moral limitation, like.. obviously there’s a fuckton of villains around, but maybe whatever lets people have powers can tell who would be  _ too _ evil, and that’s me. Or.. Or something. I don’t know, I.. _

“I just don’t want you to be adjusting more than you should. To freak out so much that you go way too hard in the other direction, you know? You’ve gone through a fucking lot, and you just got out of like.. such a fucked up thing, and.. I just don’t want you to think that who you are now is who you have to be. I know you’re better than this.”  _ Ah. _

“Vincent said the same thing to me, and I.. I don’t understand what you guys see me in, when I’m just this stupid normal girl now.”

“Quinn, jesus christ. How many times do I have to explain that I hate cape shit for you to get it? I don’t  _ want _ some superpowered girlfriend, I could like.. I don’t know, I’m sure I could find someone. Or a guy, maybe, but they’re usually more trouble than they’re worth. Especially the capes.

“That’s the thing, Quinn, is that capes are fucked up.  _ I’m _ fucked up, but I think I’ve got more of a handle on shit than most of the others. Any hero or rogue probably does - I’m not saying I’m special. Just like, fuck, I don’t know how to explain this..” She sighed, taking the lull to toss her wrappers into a nearby trash bin, before looking me in the face. I’d decided to do what she’d done, eating while she talked, but now I just looked stupid. She didn’t seem to care, but I swallowed and put the last bite or two of my soft taco on my lap just to be safe.

“You’re like this perfect mix, okay? Because capes are way too fucking edgy or depressed or violent or whatever the fuck, usually, but civilians aren’t much better most of the time. I mean, they’re not the same, but they’re a different kind of awful. I don’t want to pretend like people with shitloads of trauma are smarter or wiser or whatever, but there’s  _ something _ there that’s missing in the average loser. Life experience, I guess, which is  _ sort of _ wisdom, but like.. ugh. Words are stupid, but you get the idea.”

“Yeah,” I input in the short break in her thoughts. It was something I’d thought about a lot, but she was actually doing a much better job of explaining it than I ever had.

“Just, I don’t know, you have that  _ perspective _ without the like.. without the stupid power shit, really - I honestly just fucking hate having to deal with powers in a relationship. They make everything so needlessly complicated. Honestly like..” She scrunched up her face, quickly pecked me on the lips, and groaned, all before I could even really react. “This is stupid, but I’m scared to see if you can still feel when I link us.” She seemed frustrated just by the existence of her own emotions.

“Oh?” It was one result of me losing David’s influence that I’d never thought about specifically, but now that I was.. “I don’t think that’s stupid. It’s.. Mm..” I scooted closer to her, leaning in and holding her. She didn’t hold me back, but I didn’t mind, I just wanted to be quiet when talking about this. I wanted it to be between just us. “Even with everything that happened, that night was.. incredible. And that time with you was.. Incredible. And it’s okay to be scared about it not being able to happen again, but know that we’ll find something else, okay?”

“That’s.. Mm.” She decided to hug me back, but it was still fairly limp, so she could stop committing at any moment. “You chasing after cape shit is awful to watch when I know firsthand just how shit it can be. Maybe you get something cool, but..

“Before you, Quinn, all my power did was  _ hurt. _ Nothing else, ever. This entire part of me, like a muscle, that I can only use to make people suffer. And, worse, only by making myself suffer first.” She pulled back, placing her hands on my shoulders and keeping her face a few inches in front of mine.

“If you got stuck with something like this, or worse, I’d be here for you. But..” She leaned in closer, tilting her head a little and letting herself wrap around my back. “I much prefer you like this.” I closed my eyes, and she closed the gap, our lips pressing together in a way that felt a lot more  _ real _ than all the previous times, and-

I felt the link between us form anew, and knew everything was going to be okay.

* * *

**Fade - Rise 6.4 R**

With everything going on in my life, I was fairly blindsided by my dad reminding me that I had an appointment with an endocrinologist in an hour. Shortly after that, I realized just how fucked I was. How had I not realized sooner  _ just _ how stupid this was? They were going to be drawing blood, and inspecting me, and I’d already had way too many changes to go unnoticed. 

Some of it, like how I hadn’t needed to shave in a week, would slide under the radar, but there wasn’t any way I could hide my budding chest from people who were actually paying attention to what I looked like. There were probably even things about me I hadn’t noticed myself that they’d see and know something was up, and then everything would blow up and-

“Uhh, Dad?” I called out, before I had a full on anxiety attack. A few moments later, he was back in the kitchen with me.

“Yes?”

“Uh, sorry, just..” I put the sandwich I’d made back on the counter, and turned to him. It would be better to do this relatively face to face. “I.. need you to cancel the appointment.”

“Oh?” I didn’t see his reaction, because I was too busy trying to hide my own face. Just because we were looking at each other, more or less, didn’t mean I wanted to be making eye contact. “Why, what happened?”

“Yeah, uh, no, just.. Nothing happened, I just..”  _ Guhh.. _ “I lied? And.. I’m sorry.”

“You.. What, you mean you’re not trans, or..?” It was clear from his voice alone that he knew that wasn’t the case, but that he just didn’t have any clue as to what else I could mean.

“No, um.. So, I kinda.. I didn’t want to say anything, because you were so excited about all of this, and I didn’t want to upset you and have you like.. Because you’re a doctor, you know? And you like your job, and you were so like, guh, to- to use the.. the doctor privilege thing to get the early appointment and.. stuff?”  _ Jesus, Riley. _ I took a deep breath. “One of my cape friends has been doing the HRT kinda thing for me so I don’t really need the official stuff and I should’ve just told you but I didn’t and sorry and yeah please don’t be mad.”

“I’m-” He took a moment to consider his thoughts before responding. “I’m not mad. I’m.. surprised, but I’m happy for you, and.. I’m glad you told me this.”  _ Oh thank fuck. _ I rushed in and hugged him, and after a second he hugged me back. “That said, canceling the appointment the day of is going to cost us, and I think you’re old enough for me to ask that you pay it.”

“Okay. Yes, yeah, absolutely.” I pulled back and nodded, just happy to not be yelled at. My dad didn’t really tend to do that, but that almost made the times it  _ did  _ happen worse.

“Alright, well.. I’ll go handle that.” I nodded again, grabbed my sandwich, and headed to my room.  _ Thank fuck he’s not interested in knowing about the cape shit, or I’d be fucked. _ When I opened the door, though, I found Quinn waiting on the bed, looking cockily at me.

“Hey, ssssport.” On top of stretching out the beginning, she exaggerated the ‘t’ at the end. I sighed, my mood immediately ruined at the realization that she’d been listening in and knew I’d been lying.

“Hey..” I came inside, closing the door behind me and slumping down against it. “You hear all of it?”

“Uh-huhhhh..” She smirked. “You know, I don’t really remember reading about any Remure capes that give people tits.” I swallowed my pride and anxiety, willing to play along. If nothing else, she was clearly in a good mood, and she probably wouldn’t care much about this anyways given how she’d been the past bit.

“No? Didn’t you hear? Boon’s tech got an update, now it checks to see how ‘healthy’ your chest is.”

“Hah!” Her smirk shifted to a grin. I let myself laugh a bit, too. “That’s a good one.” With that, she slid on down to the ground, mirroring me by leaning against the bed. Why did half of these serious talks happen on the floor? “Anyways, you going to tell me what’s up, or am I going to have to bring out the interrogation tactics?”

“Oh, please god no, I get enough of that from Radar.” I felt exhausted even just  _ thinking _ about how uncomfortable talks were with him. “God, no, just.. Willy got me some stuff.”

“Some stuff?”

“Yeah, like.. pills. For hormone stuff.”

“I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that these aren’t like regular pills?”

“Yeah.”

“Illegal?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay..” She wasn’t in any position to judge, and she knew that. “So, what’s different about them?”

“Uh, faster. Better.”

“Harder, stronger?”

“Oh my god, hush.” I leaned forward and pushed her.  _ Okay, she’s  _ definitely  _ in a good mood. _ “Anyways, yeah, it does all the stuff in like three months rather than three years.”

“Oh shit.” For the first time in the conversation, she seemed to be taking things seriously. “That’s huge, Rye.”

“Yeah.”  _ Kinda is, isn’t it? _ “Hah, yeah.. and then some other stuff to like, make it stick.”

“Like.. make it permanent?”

“..Yeah.”  _ Please don’t tell me that’s a bad idea. Please. I need this, I’m supposed to do this, please. _

“That’s fucking awesome, holy shit. I wish you’d told me sooner.”

“Same, honestly.”

“Speaking of, when’d this start?”

“Uhh, almost three weeks ago.”

“Oh shit, so that’s like a fourth of the way done with the first part. Damn.”

“Oh yeah, huh, I guess so. I’d expected a bit more to have happened by this point, honestly.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” We looked at each other for a bit, with her taking the time to try to spot all the changes that had happened with me. It didn’t take long for me to get self-conscious about it.

“So, uh.. What’s up? You seem.. cheerful and stuff. Back to your usual self, kinda.” After a second of thinking, she smirked - she knew why I was asking, but also knew that  _ I _ knew she couldn’t resist talking about herself when given the chance.

“Had a pretty great talk with Barb yesterday, is all. Helped me realize how stupid I was being, and helped me come to terms with the David shit.”  _ Oh yeah. _ I’d nearly forgotten he existed, with everything going on. “And, hey, it seems like David probably wasn’t the  _ sole _ reason I adapted to your power so quickly, or why I could feel Barb’s, since I still can.”

“Feel..” I tilted my head. “What are you talking about? Her power works on everyone, I thought.”

“No, yeah, there’s just this other bit to it that apparently nobody else has noticed where like, if you pay really close attention you can feel the connection between you and her. It’s kind of like a- mm, like an umbilical cord of painful sensations.” I made a face, and she did too. “Okay, ignore that, but like.. you get the idea. I’m just super cool, it turns out.”

“Maybe it’s something on her part? Like how I thought my power was easier to process if I trusted you?” She shrugged. “I’ve got a new theory for that, by the way.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, so like-”  _ Wait. Okay. Don’t mention Willy’s lack of powers. Fucking up on the gender thing is big but it’s not  _ that _ big - that’d be like.. the fucking worst thing I could do. _ “Uh, just, Willy had me use my power on a non-cape for a job, and he reacted pretty well, also.”

“Huh. Weird.”  _ Nailed it. _

“Yep.”  _ I guess it could still be the trust thing, since I suppose I have some weirdly high level of trust for Willy. But, I don’t know, it’s.. different. But her reaction is different from Quinn’s, so it like.. Mm. _ I’d really grown to hate the ‘mystery’ of my power, over time. What had once seemed like a cool little quirk to figure out was now just like.. annoying as fuck.

“Mm, hey.”

“Hey?”

“Yeah, so..” She squinted, tilting her head to the side just a bit and considering how to put her next words. “Mm, so you’re certain this stuff is safe?” I blinked, not getting what she meant. “The pills, I mean.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

“Then you already tested them? Maybe did some searching online?”

“Uhh..” I shrugged. “Yes?”

“Riley..” She sighed. “Did you just blindly accept the supervillain’s word that these were safe and wouldn’t have any side effects, such as mind control?”

“..Yeah..”

“Rileeyyy..” She slid down from her sitting position, letting herself lazily splay out on the ground.

“Look, I-” She kicked me in the side of my thigh. “Ow!” I exclaimed, despite the fact that it didn’t really hurt all too badly.

“Dumby.”

“You’re the dumby.” I idly rubbed my thigh, more annoyed than anything else, and even then just barely. “Just.. Listen, you’ve never met her, and so you don’t know what she’s like, but.. It’s not like that. I’m certain of it, like..”

“Okay, Riley, I’ll have some faith in you, but keep an eye out, please.” I nodded.  _ Fair enough. _ “And if you start talking about evil shit, I’ll beat you up.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“I mean like.. metaphorically. You’d do the same for me.”

“Mm..”  _ Yeah. Yeah, I would. _ I slid down to the ground myself, noting how badly I needed to vacuum the carpet, but willing to put it off for now. There was still an hour or so before I had to head off to do Wardly things - even more reason why the appointment would’ve been a terrible idea - so I decided to spend some time with my best friend. It’d been far too long since we’d been able to just relax together without tons of things to stress out about running in the back of our minds.  _ Or at least my mind _ . The rest of the world could wait.

* * *

“Oh, fuck.”

“What is it?” Partition said, before I’d even closed my mouth. He looked around, for good measure.

“Ah, no, I..” I waved it off, and he immediately returned to his relatively unguarded self. He was never  _ quite _ relaxed, which seemed exhausting. “Sorry about that, no, I just realized I keep forgetting to buy my friend a birthday present.”

“Mm.” He nodded, supportively. “That’s certainly fuckworthy. How soon is it?”

“Less than a week.”

“Yeah, definitely fuckworthy.”

“Ah, it’s.. fine. You don’t need to worry.” I smiled to try to help assure him of that fact. “Sorry for interrupting.”

“If you say so.” Thankfully, he wasn’t really the type to press people on things once they turned him down once. While it was  _ occasionally _ nice to have someone insist on helping me, most of the time it just freaked me out.

“Anyways,” he continued. “As I was saying, it really just comes down to finding out what a person likes, generally. At least, that’s how you start out, and from there you can work on establishing-” He cut himself off, coming to a stop and raising his hand for me to do the same. I did, and looked around. Was he just fucking with me? I didn’t see anything. “Mm.” He relaxed. “My bad, I must’ve been hearing things.”

“Oh.” Even ignoring his age, I could definitely see why he was one of the few Wards allowed to go patrolling without adult supervision. Boon had the same privilege, but it didn’t feel as  _ earned, _ when Partition was probably the most thorough person I’d  _ ever _ worked with. It was almost to the point of being annoying, but thankfully never reached that point. After he was certain of his analysis, we continued our walk.

“Right, so you find what people like and use that as a bridge to get to know them. Depending on what you’re aiming for in the relationship, you usually either want to look to establish emotional closeness, or simply to find more in common. The other will come with time, naturally, as well as other foundational parts of your dynamic, but those two are the primary focuses.”

“So, what, like.. I don’t really know how to do that. The  _ one _ emotionally close relationship I have was kinda forced on me. And, I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad to have met her, but like.. I don’t know, she was the one who did all of that.. establishing, really. Even as a kid, she’s always been inhumanly persistent, and I guess she just liked me. Enough that my parents let her stick around, even with her awful family.”  _ Wait, shut up about personal shit.  _ “Ah, uh, but anyways, yeah, I have no idea.”

“Examples or explanations; which do you prefer?”

“Uhh..” I anxiously swallowed, having been suddenly hit by the same feeling I got when the teacher called my name despite my hand being as far from raised as it possibly could be. “Examples, I guess..?”

“Alright, so, take Boon and I.”

“Okay.”

“We’d had a weird dynamic since he got promoted to leader. Jackalope left, and they needed someone new. Boon had been around for about half a year longer than I had, and he’s a little over a month older than me. Rue came around the same time as him, but she’s too young, so it was between us two. And they went with him, which I felt was pretty reasonable.

“Boon, on the other hand, felt  _ incredibly _ uncomfortable about it. It wasn’t until a few weeks ago that we really talked about it, but I knew the whole time. The way he acted around me had completely shifted from a fairly casual acquaintanceship to being strictly business-related about everything.

“I won’t disclose what exactly we discussed, for obvious enough reasons, but the main takeaway is that I was finally able to get him to accept the state of things as they are, and to ease up a bit. You probably wouldn’t really know this, but the poor guy used to overwork himself so much more than he does now.”

“He  _ did _ always seem like he was seconds away from collapsing, in my first few weeks.”

“Exactly. Now, while still doing more than I’d like, he actually has room to do other things - to make friends, and to discover.. himself, more or less.”

“Yeah?” He nodded. “How so?”

“Well, between you and me, I think he  _ might _ be in the process of coming to terms with his sexuality, and I think our friendship has helped with that a lot.”

“Oh, cool.” A couple seconds went by, before I realized the implications. “Wait, you mean like-”

“Shift, incoming.” Radar’s voice came through my comm, and he came flying down in front of us a few seconds later, before I’d had time to prepare. It took me a moment to get over my startle, but he was thankfully patient enough to wait until I’d done that. “You’re needed.”

“Oh? I was just-” I began gesturing to Partition, but Radar cut me off again.

“No time, sorry.” He held his hand out, hovering above the ground. “Grab on and use your power.” I did as ordered, hesitantly waving to my teammate with my other arm. He seemed almost entirely unphased by the sudden turn of events, letting me know in a nod that it was okay for me to go, and that we could continue later.

I shifted us in, and even before  _ I _ had adjusted, Radar was already flying us towards what I believed to be the headquarters. While I’d gotten extremely used to the blue,  _ flying _ in it was another question. It was like when I’d used a bike for Willy, except I wasn’t in control, and we were moving twice the speed, far above the ground.  _ Wait, don’t think about her when he’s here. _ I still didn’t know the full extent of it, but I’d learned that Radar was a lot stronger than he led on.

“Uhh,” I cried out, trying not to lose my grip. “What’s going on?”

“Pythia.” He didn’t say anything else.  _ Thanks, Mr. Dickweed. _

“What, she- did she say something about me? Is it bad? Did I fuck up?”  _ Don’t think about it don’t think about it don’t think about it. _

“No.” A moment later, he corrected himself. “Maybe. I just know she needs to talk to you, urgently.”

“Ah, uh..”  _ Fuck. _ “Okay.”  _ Fuck fuck. _ Everything was happening too  _ quickly, _ and the images all around me were flashing and morphing too much, overwhelming me. How could it not? Or, in other words -  _ How the fuck is he fine? _ We were flying so fucking fast, and my head hurt, and I felt like I was going to be sick the instant we shifted out, and-

_ Fuck, right, of course, he’s got the thing. The- like he doesn’t see like I do. Maybe he can’t even tell the difference of all of this, of the blue and all the.. but there’s non-visual changes, like the lack of wind I mentioned, that’s- Okay this is just really stupid, just shut up and stop thinking, he’s probably reading my body language and thinks I’m an idiot, and maybe I am. God I really am. I’m so stupid. I should just shut up forever. _

“So,” I said, not shutting up forever, “Uh, how are you?”

“You don’t need to fill the silence.”

“Ah.”  _ Right, duh, of course. He doesn’t want to talk and I shouldn’t be talking anyways, duh. Because of all the stuff I can’t think about don’t think about it don’t think about it oh my god stop stop stop okay. Okay.. Okay, I’m good. Okay. _

“There are things you should know about Pythia.”

“Oh, yeah?”  _ Hah, hahah, guh. Are you just messing with me now? The back and forth and the- and.. guh. _

“Communicating with her is not as simple as it is between you and I. Or, more aptly, you and someone other than me, since I’m not exactly your average conversationalist.”

“Right.” I personally wouldn’t have called him a  _ good _ conversationalist, given how he didn’t seem to understand that aggressively guiding every talk was sort of off putting, but his power certainly brought him above average in some ways.

“She only rarely speaks, so you shouldn’t expect that. Primarily, she communicates through body language and illustrations. While it’s fairly effortless for me to understand what she means, that’s not the case for most others. It’s why she usually goes through me, when she wants to share a vision.”

“Then.. She wants to talk to me?”

“It’s not always as simple as that. Her mind is.. severely compromised. Part of why we’re using your power is because of how insistent she was on this - how panicked she was getting. The sooner I can get you to her, the better.”

“Oh.”  _ We probably could’ve gotten there sooner if you’d told me ahead of time, rather than just showing up out of nowhere in the middle of another conversation, but whatever I guess. In that case, I guess it’s not  _ my _ fault she’ll be suffering for a few extra seconds. Or, mm, no, depending on how long he took to fly over, it’d be minutes. Why did he do it this way? _

“Ask.”

“Huh?”

“You have a question.”

“Oh.”  _ God, I hate when you do that. Hope you can ‘read’ this. _ “Uh, I was just wondering why you came all this way, when it’d take less time from your perspective if I just walked back to base? Like, it’d be longer for me, but you would’ve saved a lot of time on flying over.”

“Mm.” He thought about the question for a lot longer than I would’ve expected. While it was kinda hard to tell where exactly we were, the base was unmistakable. We arrived before he next spoke, landing on the ground outside the front door. “I did it for you.”

“You.. Huh?”

“By her request - don’t get any ideas. I would easily prioritize her comfort over yours.”  _ Gee, thanks. Same the other way around, I guess. _ “She insisted, though. She’s a kind soul; didn’t want you to worry the entire way over. There’s also the possibility that any level of distress you accumulated would impact whatever she has to do, but..” He looked into the building, placing his hand on the glass of the door. “You can never really tell with her.  _ She _ probably doesn’t even know her reasoning.”

“Mm..” The reality of her living situation was one I only barely knew anything about, but I knew it was uncomfortable to think about. I could never even begin to imagine what a power like that would be like. I couldn’t imagine losing myself like that to my power. Sure, I’d had some trouble keeping track of time, and to a lesser degree my thoughts, but that was an exacerbation of issues I  _ already _ had. There was no way Pythia had been like this before her trigger.

In a lot of ways, I was scared to confirm her reality with my own eyes.

“Come now, let’s go on ahead with this before you stress yourself out and defeat the entire point of this.” Rather than say anything in what would’ve felt like hollow sounds, I shifted us out. Flying was a bit less overwhelming now, as he took me to her room. It was, however, a lot more  _ weighted. _ Even with the somewhat reduced pull of gravity and friction, I still had to put in effort into holding on, and not crashing into walls.

People didn’t really seem to care, funnily enough. Apparently Radar did this kinda thing all the time, or something. He was sort of melodramatic for an adult. A bit  _ edgier  _ than anyone else I knew his age, in the kinda dumb sense. In some ways, he reminded me of Quinn, which only made me understand her hatred of him even more. She had a whole lot of self love, but that just led to being her own harshest critic.

“Alright,” Radar said, coming to a stop. We were just outside her room, it seemed, in a section of the building I’d never been. I hadn’t been paying enough attention to be able to retrace my steps - something I’d tried to do on the way back. Mapping it out in reverse was always harder, though.

“Alright,” I echoed. After a moment of simply staring at the door, he nudged me forward. “Ah, you mean..”

“Some time today, yes.”  _ Right. Because she’s waiting. _

“Okay.” I took a deep breath, placed my hand on the doorknob, and turned it. Before I could even push it open, Radar had begun flying away, apparently too busy to wait a few seconds. I went in, closing the door behind me and noting how dark it was. There were a couple candles - one on a shelf and the other on the floor in the middle of the room - but other than that it was completely blocked off from all light. Even the door had been customized to not let any come in.  _ Or, do all the doors here do that?  _ I’d never really checked.

“Uh, hi,” I called out, waving to the girl.  _ Woman? _ She was sat in an oversized bed, frail and ghostly, and she  _ very _ slowly nodded in acknowledgement. Through the dark, I could just barely make out a soft, innocent-seeming smile.

“Should I..” I trailed off, expecting her to know what I was going to say. She either didn’t, or was feigning ignorance. “Ah, uh, should I sit?” There was a chair near the door, across the room from her. She raised her right arm and limply held it at me, palm up. No, not me - she was pointing at the chair. “Okay.” I sat down, overly careful not to disturb the candle that was a few feet away from me.

“So, uh, you..” I swallowed. “You wanted to see me?” After a calculated moment, she nodded. “Okay.. Well.. What about?” She twisted around and leaned over, reaching towards a stack of papers on her desk.  _ If she knows what’s going to happen ahead of time, why didn’t she prepare this? Fuck, even  _ I _ would be more prepared than this. _ Once she collected her pile, she held it out to me.

“Oh.” I felt kind of bad for assuming she hadn’t sorted them, but I also hadn’t been expecting an entire  _ pile _ of predictions. I picked them up and searched through - before me were dozens of beautiful depictions, with each serving as a slideshow of sorts for my recent life. Saving that man on the bridge, Quinn’s psychotic break, the Mixup Marshals fight.. “How long have you been holding onto these?”

It was a stupid question, and one she didn’t bother answering. ‘ _ Since before they happened, dumbass’. _ Continuing on, the sense of unease at having my privacy completely foregone grew worse and worse. Finding Quinn in my bathroom, my fight with her about David, being taken by the- I froze.

“You-” The voice that came out barely sounded like my own - too distant, too cold. “You..”  _ Run. Run. Run. Far away. Run to Willy. She can help, run- No, no, not alone. Take her. Take  _ her, _ she can’t stop you. She- _ I gripped the papers as tight as I could in an attempt to shut out the awful ideas my brain was feeding me. It didn’t make sense.

“Why?” She didn’t respond, not even a blink. “Why hasn’t Radar done anything about this?”

“Doesn’t know,” she whispered, the words crawling up my spine.  _ No, _ not a whisper - her voice was just.. hollow, and raspy, and as frail as her body. Weak, in an indescribable sense. “Trusts my judgement.”

“You-”  _ And  _ you _ trust  _ me? _ Is that it? _ “Then, what, he’s just.. what?”

“Watching my lips move. Jealous. Doesn’t want you to know he’s watching.” She raised a finger to her lips and smiled, like a faerie guiding me to help prank someone.

“No, I.. I mean, what’s he.. Guh.” Words kept slipping out of my mind rather than my mouth, and the problem only got more frustrating at the realization that Pythia almost certainly  _ knew _ this would happen, with how much of my life she was evidently aware of.  _ Does she have this much on everyone else, or am I special because of all the stupid shit Quinn and Willy have gotten me into? _

“So you’ve just..” Another hitch, a word caught on  _ something. _ “You’ve known? This whole time?”

“Yes.”

“Then.. Why? Why are you doing this? Why are you talking to me, and not turning me in, and not.. Why?”

“No need.” She tilted her head, as if to get a better angle of my reaction than what she  _ must _ have seen in a vision before. Her power seemed to target important events, and surely this was pretty damn important. And, if it was predetermined, then she was toying with me.

“Then, what I’m doing is.. fine? It’s good? All the stuff with Willy, and the.. it’s all just  _ fine?” _

“Yes.”

“Fucking _how?”_ _Ah, fuck._ Not wanting to scare her off or change her mind, I forced myself to calm down with some _very_ heavy breaths. “Okay.” I scooted the chair forward, once again cautious not to bump the candle, and leaned forward a little bit. “So all of my worrying about being evil or whatever was for nothing? About making the wrong decision? This is all good and accounted for in whatever ‘plan’ you have, and I should just stop worrying?”

“No.”

“No? I.. Then  _ what? _ Like, what, are  _ you _ secretly evil, or you just don’t care? Is that it?”

“No.”

“Then-”  _ Ah. God damn it, duh, you fucking idiot. _ “If I stop worrying about it, things go badly. And you’re telling me this because if this doesn’t happen, things go badly in a different way. Right?” It was so fucking obvious, how had I not-

“No.”

“What?” She didn’t repeat herself. “Then.. What? I can't think of anything else, can you please just.. tell me? I feel so stupid, and you're this omniscient..” I sighed, finding it easier. “Just, what is it? Why am I here?”

Pythia slowly leaned over, grabbed the drawings on my lap, and effortlessly pulled away an exact amount of the stack off the top - four, it looked like - revealing one I hadn't yet seen. It seemed very rushed, both because it was far less detailed than the rest, and in how the lines were sort of smudged and messy.

I didn't appear to be anywhere on the page, but I immediately recognized Failsafe. With him was some uncostumed cape - a woman with some sort of laser eyes - and a few people in costume that I couldn’t make out. The woman was shooting Failsafe, but the lasers stopped when they got near him, because of course they did.

What I didn't understand was why the sky was red. All evidence and logic suggested this was going to happen during the Red Iron strike against the Aviary, but that was supposed to take place early in the morning. Did this woman have some massive Shaker power that discoloured the sky? Or-

“What does this mean? Who is this girl? Is she new? Like, does she trigger here? Or is it a secret member, or.. No, because it seems like a lot of people here are hurt, and there's more capes than could just be the Red Iron. Then who is this?”

“Don't know.”

“You.. What? How can you not know? You're the one who drew this.”

“Don't remember.”

“You.. Something  _ this _ important - something worth immediately rushing me over for - and you  _ forgot?” _

“Always do.”

“Oh.” That’s why it was rushed. When she had the ability, she’d paint the scene in such detail that it didn’t  _ matter _ if she forgot. But, for some reason, this one had only a very small window of opportunity. “Sorry, I get it now.”  _ I think. _ “Should.. Do you have any idea what I’m supposed to do with this?”

“Best if you don't tell her.”

“Willy?”

“You can, but it'll be worse.”  _ Worse. _ It already looked kinda bad, but worse was definitely possible.

“Great, uh.. Fuck. Okay, then what? Any idea what I’m supposed to do with this?”

“Own conclusions will be best.”

“Ah..” Odd as it was, I felt satisfied. It’d been a while since I’d even remotely felt like my decisions were good ones, let alone that anyone else  _ thought _ they were. Even if that someone was someone I’d just met, and was more power than person. At least she seemed happy, with whatever limited experience she had.

“Thank you, Pythia.” She lowered her head in response, as if to say ‘alright, cool, now get out of my room’. Part of me wondered if she was actually conscious during these talks - if she was actually in control of her body - or if she just puppeted along by her visions, acting out what she foresaw without any other option, only to shut down when out of use. Most of me was too uncomfortable to think about that question for very long.

I left her room, deciding against saying goodbye, and got to thinking. I had five days to come up with something good, and I knew exactly the smartass to ask for advice. After all, if my conclusion was to get someone else’s help, that’d still fall under  _ my _ conclusion. At least, that was what I was counting on.

* * *

**Fade - Rise Interlude**

On the second of December, one particular PRT worker by the name of Ashley was going about her day, the same as any other. Everything had been going perfectly fine up until the point when the serenity of her otherwise fairly casual work routine was ruined. With a deafening screech, Remure broke, and the sky bled an early sunset.

“Ah, shit.”

* * *

**Fade - Phoenix 7.1**

For Failsafe, it was a very simple operation. Most were somewhat trivial, but this one was easier than the rest. All he had to do was distract Eagle - the enemy’s most potent threat - and lure her into a trap. Child’s play. Even more so when accounting for the fact that she tended to tunnel vision when she didn’t have her power guiding her along. Thinkers were all the same when you stripped them down.

Matters were made  _ even more _ trivial by the fact that there was no way for the Aviary to see it coming, since nobody was thought to know where they were living. It hadn’t even been that hard to figure out - Willy had put in  _ years _ of work to making sure she could get intel on anyone in the city with a little patience and cash. Of course, she could take that to their reasonable extremes to get an even wider reach, but this issue was entirely local, making it almost comically easy. Most importantly, it took absolutely no effort on Failsafe’s part.

They didn’t roost in a particularly bad side of town, either. It couldn’t really be called  _ easy _ living, but they’d apparently been making a lot more money than anyone in the Red Iron had thought.  _ No wonder she flew the coop. _ Even  _ Failsafe _ didn’t find his own jokes to be funny, but it didn’t feel right to just  _ not _ make them, even in cases where it was only to himself. He liked to joke about that making him heroic, in a sense, for filling a role no one else wanted to. Sometimes, though, that role included being an impatient dick.

“So,” he said into his walkie talkie. “Formal request for you to remind me what we’re waiting for.” Rather than getting a response from Willy, Stroke’s voice came out.

“Either you actually forgot, or you’re being an asshole, and either way you should be  _ very _ happy I’m not shutting you up.”

“Wow, damn, an empty threat from Stroke. In other news, Forge has been making turrets lately, and Willy’s been-”

“You’re  _ waiting,” _ Willy interrupted, falling for his bait, “because some of you aren’t in position yet. You’d do best to keep your mouth shut, lest your alert the enemy. The last thing we need is to lose a vital advantage because  _ someone _ couldn’t stay quiet for a few seconds longer.”

“Rude.”

“Answer me this, Failsafe: Are  _ you _ in position, or are you just near it?”

“I’m-” He scoffed. “Okay, fine, I’m a  _ few _ steps out of place, but I wanted to be in the sun.”

“In the sun? Great, so you moved from the spot I very specifically picked because it had a very minimal chance of providing the enemy any vision of you into a spot that puts you right in the line of sight of one of their windows, and also illuminates you?”

“Jesus, get off my back.” Sometimes he wondered why he even bothered being a nuisance for fun if people were going to be so stupid about every little thing. People were supposed to take him  _ less _ seriously, not more.

“I will when you stop putting personal comfort over the mission.”

“The curtain’s closed, they can’t see shit. It’s cold, and I figured it didn’t matter if some overly perceptive civilian spots me a couple minutes before the action starts. They’re a lot more likely to spot one of you, with you walking around in plain sight. Really, it’s not a big deal. I’m not an idiot.”

“Stroke can silence anyone who tries to contact the heroes. You’re not as smart as you think.” Before he could get a word in edgewise, she continued. “We’re ready. Get them on you and we’ll come in around the back, like we planned.”

“I know the plan!” He groaned, turning the radio off and strolling forward.  _ Maybe the Aviary has room for a guy. _ He laughed himself off, and rapped his knuckles on the window. It wasn’t long before he saw an eye peering out from a small crack near the bottom. He crouched down and waved, but they disappeared before he could really commit to the casual act.  _ Man, wouldn’t it be fucked up if we got the wrong place. That’d be fucking- _

A massive fucking bird monster burst through the wall, knocking Failsafe over onto his ass and  _ completely  _ disregarding societal conventions. Vulture must’ve decided the house was useless if the Red Iron knew about it. The other two had apparently been in costume already, which sort of ruined part of the intimidation factor. Intimidation didn’t matter  _ too _ much, though, when his side had the surprise factor  _ and _ a well developed plan.

None of the birds did anything to communicate with one another, since all of them knew Stroke would surely be nearby. What that meant, though, was that even though Eagle spotted the ambush ahead of time, she was only able to help her team out by tackling Crow. Vulture - far too large for her own good - was hit with the full weight of two capes and a couple dozen pounds of tech, sending her crashing into the ground and on top of Failsafe, who hadn’t had the time to get out from under the rubble. For how big she was, she wasn’t  _ that _ heavy.

Unfortunately for everyone who fought her, the low body weight meant she was significantly faster than you’d expect. That, combined with the very slight heads up she’d gotten from Eagle’s actions, meant she was able to shake the two capes off before Forge was able to inject her with a dose that’d do more than just  _ tickle _ a massive fucking bird monster, sending  _ them _ tumbling to the ground as she flew up.

The instant Vulture took off, Failsafe hopped up and over to his allies, moments before the flesh-burning vile came crashing down. With him around, all it did was gross people out. The three of them worked to get any and all of the stuff off of them, only taking a couple seconds because of how it all stuck together. Once that was done, he picked them both up, and they all looked at each other, ready for anything but making no moves.

Every one of them was well aware what the others were capable of, and their specific arrangement meant that they were at a standstill unless someone fucked up. The safest bet, then, was to wait until someone thought of a way they could get an advantage. Failsafe was never the best at this, but giving it a shot was better than doing nothing, so he considered the options.

Shooting any of them was a no-go. Vulture would be able to shrug it off with little issue, and Eagle was close enough to Crow to keep either of them from getting hit. Whether that would be by forcing them both to dodge until the laser hit the ground, or some other equally annoying bullshit, it didn’t matter. There was a  _ reason _ he had to spend all his time distracting her. Vulture would’ve been dealt with and the fight would’ve ended in thirty seconds flat if not for her being a little-

_ Focus. What else? _ Stroke was obviously on the lookout for anything, but these fuckers had slipped up too many times to make those same mistakes. Failsafe couldn’t run at any of them without exposing his teammates. Even if they went altogether, there was a very small chance of them all staying within his radius the entire time, and a slow, calculated walk wasn’t particularly difficult to avoid. Anything else they could throw at the birds would have the same end result as the stun guns. They had no offensive options.

The instant Failsafe realized that, he remembered the fight back at their old base. Specifically, he remembered all the times Blueline rammed herself into him before he figured out the very advanced strategy to counter it: just sort of not letting himself be pushed over. Would Vulture come up with the same, incredibly simple tactic?

Yes, she would, and she did. And she was a giant fucking bird monster. So when she came rushing forward - the  _ only _ reasonable solution to ending the standstill, as stupid as it was - it did a lot. No amount of aggressively leaning in the opposite direction was enough to stop them all from tumbling once more onto the ground. While this put them in a bit of a disadvantage, it let things continue on, and they had far too many cards up their sleeves for such a small misstep to impact much of anything. The Aviary’s fate was already long since sealed.

Stroke tried to grab hold of Vulture as she retreated, but her grip slipped. Forge managed to succeed, flying into the air while desperately clinging to her back, not having a free hand to inject her. Even if he could have, they were too far up for him to do that without them falling to their deaths. Vulture was in a similar predicament, Failsafe imagined, since he doubted she wanted to deal with the repercussions of becoming marked as a murderer.

Failsafe, for his part, had gotten up off the ground in the time he’d spent spectating. He quickly checked to confirm that Stroke was okay and standing - she was - and they both got to work on Eagle and Crow.

A kick to Stroke’s chest was a pretty good indication that they’d spent more time concerned about Forge and Vulture than the birds had. It was all but confirmed when Failsafe got punched in the face by Eagle, knocking him away from the other two. He dodged another two blows, grabbed her, and tossed her against a nearby wall. While she recovered, he yelled to his teammate, who had been pinned and was doing nothing to resist.

“Just punch her!” It was endlessly frustrating watching people deal with Strangers. It seemed  _ obvious _ that if you suddenly found yourself in pain, pinned by someone in a costume that fit the theme of your enemies,  _ while _ you were in the middle of a fight, that you’d realize you were supposed to punch them.

Eagle came back for more, and the two of them exchanged a few blows while Crow held Stroke in an eternally stupid stunlock; erasing all memory of herself over and over again. Thankfully, Eagle was just as stupid as Stroke was being - letting herself get caught and thrown once more, this time at her ally. The two birds fell to the ground - which seemed to be the peak of the tactics that would be used for the fight.

Briefly, Failsafe missed Magister. The dumb fuck was absolutely dumb as fuck, but he singlehandedly stopped shit like this from happening. He also did a lot of other stupid shit, and often was more of a hinderance than a help, so Failsafe got over it pretty quickly and ran over to Stroke, helping her quickly stand up.

“Don’t let the bird touch you.” She nodded, processing it just in time for it to not matter whatsoever. A loud as fuck sound came from above, and suddenly none of the four of them were all too interested in continuing to flop around like idiots, when we all knew nothing was going to come of it.

The sound turned out to be a whole lot of shattering glass, as Vulture and Forge had crashed into a building. Maybe he’d injected her with a smaller dose on one side, or maybe she did it to try to get him off without losing her advantage - who could know for sure? It didn’t matter the intention, because the end result was a whole lot of eyes and a whole lot of trouble for everyone involved.

“Truce?” Failsafe asked. He covered Stroke’s eyes, and she was still a little too dazed to get pissed about it. “Just nod if yes.” The birds looked at each other, then nodded. “Great, cool, let’s go make sure we don’t all get thrown in jail.” He let go of Stroke’s face, instead taking her hand to guide her, and the four of them began running towards the mess.

And then - because  _ fuck _ them in particular - Quaver came out of nowhere and shouted something in what seemed like Japanese, the path under his feet rising up to block them. Stroke was at least aware enough to capitalize it, but the guy didn’t seem even remotely phased.

“Baguette! Quesadilla!” His foreign words carved a mote around the villains, too large to jump. Eagle, being the annoyingly persistent little shit she always was, had hopped over before the rift had gotten all too large, and was rapidly approaching the boy. “M-Mozzarella! Strudel! Falafel!” Grooves appeared on the ground at her feet with every syllable, but it was no use.

After an impossibly swift ascension, Eagle kicked Quaver off his platform, and fell along with him. Her power didn’t protect her from looking like an idiot  _ after _ she countered her enemies, funnily enough. She could deal with whatever other heroes were on the other side of the wall - all Failsafe had to worry about was finding a way to get them all out of the-

The cracks in the ground closed up, and not just it. Every other distortion reverted itself far faster than it should’ve. Had she  _ killed _ him? There was no fucking way.

As the makeshift wall descended back into the ground, it gave way to a very alive and conscious Quaver, Eagle, and Blare. The former two seemed confused and horrified. Blare was unconcerned with Eagle, focused upwards as a shadow washed over them. The bird monster descended, using her talons to carry Forge and-  _ Vulture? _

It looked past the group closest to it, directly at Failsafe, Stroke, and Crow. It cocked its head, waiting for something. Blare had fought Vulture enough times to know which of his tech would and wouldn’t be helpful, and apparently he hadn’t packed any of the good stuff.  _ Or are you scared, too? _

“Kill it-!” Stroke cut herself off partway, covering her mouth with her hands, eyes wide and terrified. No. No, that wasn’t it. She hadn’t cut herself off, she-

Blare pulled out the best he had - some sort of orb - and flung it at the monster with as much force as he could. It burst open with a terrible noise which must’ve been a thousand times worse up close, judging by Quaver and Eagle’s reactions. The monster didn’t flinch, using its beak to bash the tech in a  _ very _ precise manner, taking it out in only a moment. With it gone, it turned its head to Blare, aggressively staring him down.

It dropped its two hostages, and began changing. It wasn’t a fast process, or a pretty one, but Failsafe had seen it all before. Vulture’s power was a particularly disgusting one, and this was no different, as it shifted from a horrid monster to a woman who couldn’t have been older than twenty-five. No one did anything, frozen by that stupid part of the brain that wanted to let curiosity kill. At least, that’s what it was for Failsafe, but everyone else seemed to be nothing short of horrified.

But -  _ fuck _ \- he realized there was more to it than that. He knew the woman. He recognized her: one of Willy’s powerless goons, now as far from that label as one could be.

“Hey, girl!” he yelled. She turned to face him, disregarding her grudge for Blare in an instant. Stroke flinched out of the corner of his eye, then tried and failed to steel herself. “So I guess we win!” Once again, she tilted her head to the side. The action looked far less comfortable in this form - just a  _ bit _ too far. “So, let’s wrap this shit up and we can get you some clothes, and maybe we can see about getting some cake with Willy to celebrate our-”

“Don’t say her name.” Her voice tore through the walls around her in jagged line, and she began walking towards him.

“Uh..”  _ Shit. _ “Okay!” He held his hands up. “Cool, I can do that. Just you and me, then?” 

“I hate you, stupid boy.” She took the crevices that opened under her feet in stride, uncaring and unwavering. “Your stupid little nothing power. Ignorant, annoying-” She stopped, violently cocking her head to the side again and breathing in sharply. After a moment, she let the breath out, fixed her posture, and returned to approaching him. “Worthlessly brave.”

“Alright, alright, gotcha.” After a couple more steps, she’d apparently gotten close enough that Stroke felt the need to back away. Crow might’ve done the same already, but Failsafe couldn’t be sure because she was out of his peripheral vision. He stayed strong. He had to.

“Yeah, I don’t know.” He shrugged. “I think my power is a fair bit better than ‘nothing’, personally. It’s nice knowing you won’t be able to do anything to me, even after you finish your..  _ very _ slow walk.” She’d come a little more than halfway from where she started to where he as -  _ really _ taking her time with it. He barely remembered the woman, but she never seemed like such a drama queen.

“I don’t need to hurt you,” she said.

“Oh, yeah?”  _ Sure wish anyone else was doing anything to try to hurt  _ you, _ but sure, why not. I’ll just stall forever and everything will be fine - no other actions have to be taken. Super great. _

The plan to stall didn’t work out very well. She stopped when she reached the broken down wall of the Aviary’s house-base, crouched down, and began picking up scraps of things here and there. If she was capable of what Failsafe thought, then she was almost certainly looking for materials to make tech with. Everyone else must’ve been well aware of her power, too, which meant Failsafe was the only one who was willing to do anything.

And he did.

“Uhhh, hey lady!” One step after the other, he walked over to the woman and the hole, trying  _ really _ hard not to think about how that sounded all the way. While he was certainly walking faster than the woman had, he wasn’t able to muster up the will to move as quickly as he would’ve liked. “Lady, hey!” She didn’t react to him at all, wholly focused on her collection.

“We should give you a name, right? Something to call you? You steal powers, so maybe we could do something with that?” The closer he got, the freakier she seemed. She was so  _ still, _ apart from the very careful motions of her gathering. Nothing that wasn’t in use was moving at all.

“Uh..” He swallowed, checking on the others. Forge, Vulture, Eagle, Blare, and Quaver were gone - probably more than a couple of them carried away. You could always count on heroes to keep your guys safe in the worst of scenarios - the idiots couldn’t prioritize their own lives for shit.

He didn’t bother to check behind him. Crow was too much of a selfish bitch to do anything other than find somewhere to hide. Stroke would’ve gone to get help, but she was mute, and Crow’s power stopped her from writing anything down about the big bad. Failsafe briefly pondered what would happen if someone took a picture of Crow now - if it’d erase itself once she got her power back.

His only chance at competent backup coming any time soon was entirely dependent on a group of five with at least a forty percent ‘knocked out’ rate. And, judging by the state of the tech creation, he probably didn’t have much time.  _ Better do some damn good stalling, then. _

“Uh, right, so.. Staying in the theme, being all official or whatever, what about like.. Swindler? Swindler could work. I’m sure Willy would love that.” Even then, no response. How could she  _ freak _ the fuck out about the name one moment, then not so much as  _ flinch _ the next time it’s mentioned? Why was she so fucking  _ precise? _ Was this how Eagle’s power interacted with those of Tinkers?

What was this monster even making? What  _ could _ she make out of all this garbage? Sure, Tinkers were notorious for making wine out of sewer water, but she hadn’t even gone  _ inside _ the house to look for materials, yet. He considered kicking what she had out of her hands, but decided that that’d be really stupid.

_ So, okay, what can she make? _ Forge’s tech was pretty intense, but given everything she had at her disposal already, it didn’t seem too bad. Blare’s tech, on the other hand, was fucking awful. She could just make a really loud screeching thing and it’d be the worst, basically. Would she be able to combine the two to make a sound-based incapacitator? Surely that’d be a bit too much, right? Failsafe swallowed again, slowly losing his ability to tell himself this was all going to be fine.

For the sake of his sanity, he decided to work under the assumption that she couldn’t merge Tinker powers into one super-tech, and looked for other combinations. Eagle’s power was clearly speeding things up, but what else was there?

_ She could make a headset that lets her hear everyone in the city and shut them down with Stroke’s power. She could make her bird form more like.. I don’t know, just more powerful in general? Maybe send the vile flying with sound waves or something? Uh, she could.. Could she do anything with Crow? I don’t think so. Same with Eagle, beyond this. So that leaves Quaver- _

_ Oh fuck it’s a megaphone. Oh fuck oh fuck oh god oh jesus shitting dick. _ There was no way it could be anything else, now that he really looked at it. Depending on how strong it was, she could do some serious fucking damage. Quaver, unassisted and barely trained, was horrific. Magnifying his power to extremes, with the knowledge of how to use it to perfectly maximize damage to your opponents? That was  _ cataclysmic. _

Kicking it out of her hands didn’t seem like such a stupid idea anymore, even if it started a fight. All the powers in the world, and she was still just a human to him. The only thing she had on him was bird mode, and that transition took a lot of concentration, probably. Probably would have to be good enough.

Ready for the worst, he kicked her work in progress onto the floor.  _ Now fight me. _ She didn’t. She picked it back up, and got back to business. So he kicked it again. And again, she picked it up. This time, though, she shifted around so her back was to him in a sort of pathetic attempt at getting him to stop. He moved around to the side and kicked it again, and she grabbed his leg and pushed him away, sending him onto his ass for what felt like the thousandth time today.

“Okay, fuck you.” He got back to his feet and took a deep breath. This was going to be fucking weird.

He kicked her back, sending her face into the tech and leaving a rough, dirty imprint of the bottom of his shoe on her shirt. She slowly rolled her shoulders, sat back up, and began to stand before he kicked her again. Anyone who walked by without context would probably assume he was a monster.

The woman moved much more quickly in her second attempt at standing up, dodging his kick and once again pushing him back. With a fair bit of effort and a whole lot of spite, he managed to avoid falling down. Then, with all the fury of a million ass-falls, he charged forward. Colliding with her - sending  _ her _ to the ground - felt pretty fucking nice.

She looked up at him, squinted, and growled. A deep, low growl that barely sounded like it could come from a girl. Just when Failsafe thought he’d somehow distracted the woman from her goal, and redirected her focus to acting like an angry dog, he fell. The drop must’ve been at least ten feet. The ground beneath his feet had remained in tact, but the concrete outside of his radius had been shoved out of the way, creating a hole just large enough for him to fall into.

This also meant, because of how Quaver worked, that he only had so long before the gap closed and was stuck inside the world’s shittiest coffin. His immunity, along with the reactive nature of Eagle’s power, was the only reason she hadn’t immediately sealed his fate. That, or she had some humanity left in her. One could hope.

Before he got to work on climbing out of the incrementally shrinking hole - which spelled his inevitable doom if he didn’t hurry up - he turned his walkie talkie back on.

“Failsafe to anyone.” He propped his feet up against opposite sides of the hole and began the slow, improvisational shimmy that would save his life.

“Finally!” Willy shouted, startling him enough that he almost dropped the radio. Thankfully, he was too cool for that. Or something.  _ God, I’m really off my game. _

“Yeah, hi.”

“Where the fuck have you been?” It was a pretty good question. There were quite a few points where he could’ve filled her in, but he’d just sort of forgotten. It was better if she didn’t know that, though.

“Busy keeping the city safe. Didn’t have any time to spare.” He grunted, only letting go of the button partway through.

“What was that? What’s going on?”

“Uh, nothing - climbing out of a hole.”  _ And doing a shit job of it. _

“A hole?”

“Quaver, sort of. Some girl who works for us, I don’t remember her name. Triggered when Vulture and Forge crashed into a building, I guess. Steals powers, got everyone of us and Quaver and Blare. Making a megaphone or something, working on stopping her.”

“Shit.” She sighed. Normally she wouldn’t have sent that over, but she must’ve forgotten to let go. “This was supposed to be a simple operation, and now..”

“Yeah.” With that, there was radio silence for a minute or so. He used the time to focus on climbing, and got near the top when Willy next came through.

“You almost out?”

“Working on it.”

“That’s not what I asked.” He groaned, clipped the radio on his costume and once again focused on getting out. It was just a few more shoves, and then.. He gripped the rim at the top, pushed himself up with his legs and pulled with his arms as hard as he could until he got his arms and his head above ground. The rest of the climb out was effortless in comparison, but he had a new problem.

“I’m out. She’s not here.”

“Of course she’s not - why would anything ever be easy?” Another sigh. “Well, see if you can find her. I’m on my way, almost there.”

“Already on it,” he lied. He’d been taking some time to catch his breath, but got started then by going into the house. “And, hey, don’t come. It’s too dangerous.”

“That’s not your decision to make.”

“You weren’t here when this started, and it’s a lot worse now. And she hates you now, or something. Don’t come.”

“I’ll be fine. Even if I’m not, maybe that’s all she wants. I’d gladly give myself up if it means you and the others can keep the mission alive.”

“That’s stupid.” She didn’t respond, and he still hadn’t seen any sign of the woman. Though he didn’t know what it looked like before, the Aviary’s house-base seemed mostly untouched, and he’d nearly checked the whole thing. “I think she went out to the street or something. Going to check.”

“Okay.”

“You should probably tell the PRT what’s going on.”

“I’m sure someone else has that handled. I’m not leaving you.”

“Mm.” He didn’t transmit it, but he considered repeating it just so she could hear it. She was so  _ thoughtful, _ in a way he didn’t really get _. _ It wasn’t rare for him to feel like a bit of an asshole, since he didn’t feel the same way about the rest of the ‘family’ as they seemed to feel about him. They were friends, sure, but.. “What about Blueline?”

“What about her?”

“She’s not ready yet. Not even close. If this freak kills you, what happens with Blueline?” She didn’t take even a second to consider it - she’d surely thought about it many times before.

“The three of you teach her. You’re a perfect replacement for the job, really. Stroke can train her in combat, Forge can teach her how to act the part, and you’re entertaining enough that she won’t get bored.”

“You hate my jokes.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” Another silence followed, and he  _ still _ hadn’t found the woman. She could’ve flown away, for all he knew. And, at this point, it was probably only a matter of minutes before she got to work on tearing the city apart.

He did, however, find  _ a _ woman that he knew. Willy had been coming from where he was going, which further hit home the fact that he’d lost the monster, but he didn’t really care. Feeling a bit defeated, and not really wanting to walk anymore, he sat down and up against the wall of a building. She closed the rest of the gap and crouched down next to him, speaking softly.

“I take it you didn’t find her?”

“No. You?”

“No.”

“Damn.” He knew she hadn’t, but it still sort of stung to confirm that they’d completely and totally failed. “At least you and I will be safe.” She smiled in his peripheral vision, but didn’t say anything. They sat and waited, and waited, and waited until he didn’t feel like waiting in silence anymore.

“It’s looking pretty bad.” She nodded in agreement. “You think we’ll win this?”

“We can’t afford not to.”

“Mm.”

In a heartbeat, the air shifted - as if the city itself was holding its breath in anticipation. A light static rang through, and the screeching chased shortly behind it. It was impossible to tell, all things considered, but it really seemed like she must’ve been nearby.

The skyline fractured, light coming through at an angle that would’ve been gorgeous outside of context. An abstract wave that broke reality fell downward as the monster’s pitch did, carving massive sculptures out of anything that stood above the ground. Eventually, even the streets were broken.

And then it stopped, and the only screaming the remained was that of her victims, and it was quickly snuffed out. One by one, their scared voices were taken from them by a creature that would only get more and more terrifying.

Though it appeared as if night was rapidly approaching, the day had just begun. There was all the time in the world for for matters to get worse.

* * *

**Fade - Phoenix 7.2**

Only a few minutes had passed since Remure broke, and Zack was growing more and more thankful that he hadn’t been cleaved. It wasn’t lethal, but that almost made it worse. People, in the streets and in the privacy of their own homes, bound to their current position because no living being could possibly know how to adjust to moving with their entire  _ body _ having been scrambled. He shuddered, against himself. It hit too close to home.

“Marionettist,” Radar said, tearing through the blooming panic. “I hope you’ve been listening, because we don’t have much time.”

“I have.” Unfortunately for him, he was  _ very _ good at multitasking, so long as one of the tasks involved feeling like shit in one way or another. Usually he was also great at masking that, but circumstances made that a fair bit harder at the moment.

“Good. We can’t afford to mess this up.” He was already well aware of that. The entire city, and possibly the world, depended on  _ Zack _ fucking  _ Downes _ not making a mistake. They didn’t have many options, if this failed, before they reached the point of ‘nuke everything’. He  _ had _ to succeed.

Darkness encroached once again, threatening to consume him, getting closer and closer and- Mortar placed a hand on his back. He looked at her, and she looked at him, and he felt simultaneously better and worse. If he failed,  _ she _ could end up killed. But.. in a weird way, it was nice to know that someone else felt the same way about him. It was at least enough that he could put most of his attention towards Radar.

“She’s headed away from us, so you’re going to aim to intercept her from behind. The terrain is too harsh for us to send you in vans, and we probably don’t have the time to spare anyways. Mortar, you’ll obviously be carrying Flicker to the battlefield.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Sprawler’s going to have to take Sudsmission and Marionettist.” She grunted in acknowledgement. “You’re both going to have to stay low. If the rifts get in the way, take the long route over the one that leaves you exposed. She can already fly - we don’t need to give her  _ more _ mobility.

“Once you’re within range, Sprawler’s going to retreat and leave you two behind. Marionettist is going to cover Leech’s eyes, and - Mortar - you’re going to have to move in the  _ instant _ that happens. Maybe even before, if it’s not a risk. The surprise factor is all we have, and Flicker needs to be able to be in range to keep her consistently blinded. Then, it’s on you to bring Sudsmission over to the target so she can contain her.”

“Okay,” Mortar said, nodding again. It was sort of haunting how stoic she was forcing herself to be, when she was usually  _ begging _ to be included in missions more often. Radar must’ve felt the same way.

“A lot of this hangs on you, and I understand how hard that must be, but I know you can do this. If you fail, that’s okay too. We have other options.”  _ Fuck. _ Even more evidence that this situation was  _ fucked  _ \- Radar  _ never _ lied about this shit. He never padded the odds - he never made false promises - he never  _ fucked around _ when it came to cape shit. They  _ didn’t _ have options, or else he wouldn’t be sending the Wards as their first attempt. Especially when Quaver had already gotten hurt.

“Okay,” Mortar echoed. She hadn’t been around for much longer than Shift had been, and was far younger than her, but even  _ she _ knew enough about Radar to see through this. She knew how bad this had to be. How much weight was on her shoulders. On all of their shoulders.

“We should get going,” Zack said. He couldn’t bear to sit around and hear lies from someone whose power was ‘too dangerous to risk getting stolen’ while people were out there dying. Someone like Leech didn’t bother with mercy. His  _ parents _ could be dead, and he’d have no way of knowing. There wasn’t any time to check on them. There wasn’t any time for anything at all. They just had to-

“Right, yes.” Radar sighed. “Yes, you should. The rest of us will stay here and set up the next plan, should this not work out.” Nobody moved, at first, except for Zack. With him having cut the ice, the others came along, forming their groups. “Stay alive,” he called out, right before they left the building.

The mood outside was a lot harsher. Inside the base, there was some level of deniability, but now he could really feel just how bad it-  _ How many fucking times am I going to pretend like I’m fully grasping this shit?  _ The situation was a million times more fucked than anything he’d ever dealt with - there was  _ going _ to be some part of his perspective missing. Now was the time to be  _ formative, _ not reflective. Any future catastrophe would look back on this. He had to be amazing.

But, first, to his disdain, he had to be tightly held by his stretchy, fleshy superior. It was certainly less pervasive than some of the other possibilities the day had presented. He’d have to suck it up.

“Ready?” Sprawler asked.

“I guess.”

“Mhm,” Sudsmission said, with none of the hesitation Zack had. With that, Sprawler stretched out her left arm at the cost of her right and wrapped it around the two of them, leaving a thin layer of skin between them as a wall. It wasn’t much better than if it hadn’t been there, but it was a nice bit of consideration, he guessed.

She began the somewhat disgusting act of elongating her legs and other arm to move around, shifting around her body mass in any way you could imagine. No matter how many times he saw it, it never got any less gross. Through the disgust, he noticed she was just a little bit slower than usual, and wondered if that was because she was being careful to avoid Leech’s line of sight, or because she was carrying more people than she was used to.

Sudsmission, for her part, seemed unconcerned. At least, she didn’t seem concerned with any  _ fleshy _ matters - instead with the task at hand. Zack should’ve been doing the same, but he couldn’t keep his mind off of things, off of being held down, unable to move, and disgusted and scared, for different reasons but still scared, and wanting to fight but he couldn’t, and-

He took as deep a breath as he could, and then a few more, to steady himself. This was for the greater good. He had to suck it up, for everyone’s sake. He was better than this.

Sudsmission had taken notice, he realized, and was offering a supportive look. It didn’t really help ease anything, but he forced himself to act like it did, giving back a somber smile.

The ride wasn't particularly enjoyable, even ignoring the tightness which Zack was trying very hard to ignore and was definitely not failing and panicking at all and-  _ In and out. Don't stop. _ He redirected his attention to the distraction once more.

The ride wasn't particularly enjoyable, given how he was being flung about by a shifting pile of human goop. The goop was a friend - in the closest way any adult could be - but that just made it worse. It was like-

_ Okay, god damn it, just stop thinking about this altogether. Just think about something else. Think about the mission. Think about your family, and everything you have to lose. You need to be stronger than this. Strong than some stupid fears, or reminders, or whatever. There’s so much worse to be afraid of, don’t you get that? This is the biggest threat you’ve ever faced, and maybe even the worst the  _ city _ has faced, so suck it the fuck up and get ready. _

He didn’t have much time left to prepare, as they came to a stop and Sprawler pulled herself off of her teammates. They’d arrived faster than Zack had expected, which was good for more than just the sake of humanity. Sudsmission and him thanked her as best as they could without any words.

Leech was very audibly just a few blocks away, shouting away into her megaphone a bunch of barely sensical shit about some ‘Fiora’ betraying her, letting her voice tear into the world around her like it didn’t matter at all. Were they really being devastated by someone’s  _ bitter ex?  _ She could raise her voice at any point just a  _ bit  _ higher, at  _ just _ the right pitch, and completely rip into him. And, worse, if he stepped out of line he’d have no way to defend himself from any  _ other _ kind of attack she’d use.

Creeping around, he tried his best to prepare for the worst. She had two full teams worth of powers, with all the synergies between them at her disposal. His side had a terrible plan with an incredibly low chance of success that was only being done because even if they fucked up, the villain wasn’t going to gain much.

Radar hadn’t said as much, but it was pretty clear when he talked about how  _ his _ power was too dangerous. It absolutely was, and it was the right decision to keep him behind, but it was made painfully apparent just how useless Zack was.

Mortar was strong, but Leech could already fly. Sudsmission’s bubbles didn’t mean  _ shit _ when she had plenty of ways to outright kill you. Flicker’s was the most concerning, but even then, there were more than enough ways to get around his light manipulation. All of their powers were barely if  _ at all _ troublesome for her to get, and his was the worst of all.

At least if he died, it wouldn’t cost the team much.

They’d gotten into position during his miniature breakdown, and had line of sight with Mortar and Flicker. Just around the corner, she was there. Would she be in bird form, or just a woman? The plan only worked if she had  _ arms _ to manipulate, and if not.. could they afford to wait until she reverted to her normal self?  _ If _ she went back to that? What the fuck would they do if-

_ Wait. No. Vulture can’t talk in bird form. _ He was working himself up over nothing again. It was still the same one in a million chances, not one in a billion. There were only a few  _ thousand _ ways this could blow up in their face, rather than infinite. He’d never faced worse odds, but at least they were a damn long way away from futile. Now all he had to do was ride this high for long enough to carry out the mission.

He looked to Mortar, and she looked back, locking eyes. Assuming Leech was at most  _ as _ good at Eagle in terms of power usage - which was hopefully not an outrageous leap in logic - they had a few seconds to make this work. Radar had suggested that Mortar get moving before Zack even stepped in, but it was anyone’s guess if she was going to take that suggestion seriously. Normally she was all about rushing in, but this was different.

_ Here goes nothing. _ He held his hand up and splayed his fingers out so it was obvious how many were up at any given time. With each second, he lowered one, until-

He hopped out from around the corner, spotted her, and locked on. Mortar and Flicker were moving. He held his hands in front of his own eyes and immediately felt his grasp on Leech dwindle. He had half a minute before control fully slipped, but by that point they’d all be dead. It had to be enough.

It wasn’t.

A harsh crunch rung through the air, followed by two sets of immediately-silenced screams.

Zack tore his hands away to and looked upon his immobile allies, and nearly threw up. He latched on, tighter than ever before, and shoved his hand into his mouth, tearing away at his throat as best he could, clawing and shredding and-

She spotted him, and he felt empty.

And he blinked, and his arm came out from his mouth, and it held up high, and it waved around a bit, and she let go.

He blinked again, staring down at his shaking hands, and then up at the scene, and then to Sudsmission, and then back, and he ran at the bitch. The closer he got, the more he needed to puke, but the vile surely would’ve burned so badly he’d black out, with the damage he’d done. The thought made him more nauseous. He sucked it up.

Leech didn’t seem to care about him, or the capes she’d just brutalized. She was just focused on trying to get a hang of Quaver’s power, and was failing. Nothing more than little rifts which quickly blinked away - the result of pathetic squeaks that seemed to hurt her more than the world around her. He wanted to take advantage of the vulnerability, but there was nothing he could do to her.

He reached his shaking arms down to Mortar, clawing them under and heaving her up. He looked to Flicker, briefly, and hoped it was known that he’d come back for him. There was nothing he could do to communicate that, so he just had to hope. If anything could go right, it had to be that.  _ Please. _

He turned around and slowly dragged his feet along the ground, too dazed and weighed down to go any faster. Mortar was looking up at him, and he did his best to avoid looking back. Blocking it out was all he could do. He just had to move forward. No stopping.

Everything had gone wrong in a matter of seconds. They’d been completely demolished in seconds. Fucking seconds. He made it around the corner, and a sigh of relief escaped him uncontrollably-

The breath stopped, and confused him a little. He was exhaling so sharply, and-  _ Ah. _ She must’ve heard, and suppressed it. Breathing must’ve meant something, before. Some sort of nuance to it that was now lost. Hopefully it wasn’t that important.

Sudsmission was there, and she took Mortar out of his hands. He had to go back, or Flicker would surely die, and there were others too - too many. So many, too many for him, he couldn’t- He couldn’t- But he had to, he.. Something, he.. He had an idea.

“Mm,” he croaked out at quietly as he could, trying to ignore the sting. He leaned up to Sudsmission’s ear, and chose his words carefully so he could use as few as possible while still getting the message across. “Bubble the down.”

She understood, and began producing a myriad of the things. Each one that was made went around the corner, presumably homing in on people. Zack didn’t pretend to understand how her power worked without line of sight, but it sure was appreciated here.

The entire time this was going on, he was bracing for some sort of retaliation - for Leech to  _ give a shit _ and fight back. But it wasn’t an attack, and Eagle’s power must’ve told her that. She didn’t care about them. All of this damage she’d done, and she didn’t  _ care. _ It was better than the alternative, he figured, but it was a fuck of a lot more daunting.

If she wanted to, she could easily just follow the bubbles to find the source and steal the power as well, but she didn’t. Why didn’t she? What did she  _ want, _ then? She clearly didn’t give a shit about killing the universe or whatever, but it’d seemed like she at the very least wanted to steal everything she could, and the only reason she wouldn’t include Sudsmission in that is if she didn’t care about anything that wouldn’t help her kill.

It all pointed back to this ‘Fiora’, whoever she was. Because of Stroke’s power, there was no way to bargain with Leech, to offer some sort of..  _ something.  _ Help, maybe? Help tracking down Fiora? That wasn’t really the heroic thing to do, but if this got bad enough..

_ Ugh. _ He didn’t understand, and he wasn’t sure if he’d ever understand. He wanted so badly to help on  _ any level, _ but now he was even less useful than before. He had nothing going for him. Everything felt so cold.

What if he never got his power back? It was awful, and barely worth the disgust in terms of strength, but it was  _ his. _ Even if he didn’t want it to be, it was a part of him. To be left with the trauma, and to have his consolation prize snatched away..?

Maybe it could’ve been freeing, in some sense, if it’d been his decision. If he was able to give up his life as a cape, would he take it? What would he do if it was just gone now? What if they birdcaged Leech, and no one got their powers back? Or if the only way they could get their powers back was with Leech’s death - would they kill her? Was his power worth a human life? Or dozens of people’s powers?

And why the fuck was everything so calm in the middle of deadly battlefield? His mind kept coming back to it -  _ Why aren’t you stopping us? _ She didn’t want hostages, apparently, so  _ what? _

His useless, hazey internal questioning session came to an end as the stream of floating bubbles began coming back around the corner. Flicker was the first, with several civilians following, frozen in place - only moving from the translucent, pinkish orbs that held them up. It was kind of like one of those machines where you put in a quarter and it spat out some random plastic toy, each with its own container.

Sudsmission nudged him, taking him even further out of his brainfog, and gestured for them to start walking with her head. They weren’t going to be getting a lift back, it seemed. Time to think, maybe, but also time for people to bleed out. He was already avoiding checking to see if it looked like people were breathing, but now it was a more conscious effort.

So they walked, and Sudsmission carried his teammate. Why hadn’t she bubbled her as well? Manually carrying Mortar back surely was going to take more time, so why? Was she worried Leech would change her mind, track her down, pop her bubbles and send those inside crashing into the concrete? It was probably a valid concern, but the thought just made him wish he had it in himself to carry someone as well.

The world was deafly quiet, save for the sound of shuffling. Leech’s screaming had ceased. She was doing something, surely, but it wasn’t as obvious or as widespread as it had been. That was some small win, probably.

Every once in a while, they’d come across a ridge, and they’d have to climb it. It was a lot harder without the ability to stretch. Sometimes, it was so hard they had to go around the long way. Exposure didn’t even matter for most of the, anymore, but Radar’s advice still managed to manifest.

Did he know what was going to happen, ahead of time? He was always so close with Pythia - did he send them off despite knowing the outcome? Despite knowing the cost? Surely he wouldn’t, right? Not with kids’ lives at stake. The youngest of the Remure heroes. There’s no way he could’ve known with certainty, even if they  _ all _ went into it knowing it was a stretch.

What came next? When they got to the base, what would they do from there? Zack couldn’t imagine an Endbringer fight was much more hopeless than where they were now. Even with only a handful of powers, and none of the  _ really _ bad ones - Radar, Mirage, Legion - she was already the worst the city had seen.

Probably, at least. He couldn’t imagine something worse being kept out of the history books, but there was a  _ lot _ they didn’t tell the general populous. It’d be stupid to assume the  _ Wards _ were given the full picture.

Zack decided it would be better to focus on identifying the most concerning capes for Leech to power-jack. Maybe something useful would come of that. Better than being annoyingly paranoid or bitter.

Radar’s was pretty bad, in that it’d let her steal more powers far more easily, and would keep them from getting anywhere near as close. That assumed his vision would interact with line of sight powers in the way that it seemed like it would, but it seemed pretty naive to pretend there was a possibility of it being anything else. They had to prepare for the worst, and it looked like the worst was all they were going to get.

Mirage was already a stupidly strong Stranger, so giving that to Leech would similarly  _ severely _ reduce their options for countering her. There wasn’t more to say about her, but her and the rest of Hush’s monsters hadn’t shown up above ground in a while, so they were  _ probably _ fine on that front.

_ Next.  _ Legion’s self-duplication was almost certainly an instant game over for the human race. Since the power carried over to each of the clones, it was fairly reasonable to assume the rest of Leech’s powers would come with. Worst of all, given how many of the clones there were sprinkled around the city, it was just a matter of time before things went to shit.

He forced himself to trudge a little faster.

_ So who else, then? _ Meteor Maid was concerning in terms of the pure lethality mixed with Eagle’s power, but not as concerning as it could be, given Leech didn’t seem to care about killing. Trojan added even more ways to evade damage, though the Master part probably wouldn’t matter. Shift’s power was similar to Trojan’s, and would mix with the other mobility to be fairly catastrophic. Aggregate would.. He wasn’t really sure how that would manifest, and didn’t want to figure it out.

_ Villains, then. _ She already had all of the Aviary and Red Iron, so he could skip those. None of Hush’s monsters were as big of a concern as Mirage. The Mixup Marshals were gone. The Seekers had just shown up recently, but..  _ Hmm. _ Case 53s might actually be a viable solution to defeating Leech. Throw enough of them at her, and maybe she just breaks? Forecast, though, was not a Case 53, and would be pretty bad as well.

If nothing else, at least  _ most _ of the current ‘really bad’ tier powers were heroes, and as such could be reliably kept somewhere safe. The biggest concern was Legion, but Zack was trying very hard not to think about that right now. There was no point, really - they couldn’t do anything about it other than pray, if one was inclined to do that. Pray and wait.

* * *

In less time than expected, but more time than they had, they were back at the base. The bubbled were being delivered to Boon, and people were talking. Apparently a second plan was already about to be in motion. Something involving Forecast and Sprawler. Zack didn’t waste their time by asking for the details on what exactly the plan was and how it came to be. He just needed to find an opening, since he wasn’t able to be loud enough to get everyone’s attention.

“If this doesn’t work, we’re-” Meteor Maid cut herself off, looked at the Wards who were present, and groaned. “I don’t think we can afford to let her roam around until she passes out. We could evacuate the city, but she’s fast enough that it wouldn’t matter. How long can we delay this before she gets something that takes her threat over the edge from  _ potential _ S-Class to  _ actual _ S-Class?

“We can’t even get fucking backup because of how badly she wrecked the sky. Not to mention  _ Crow, _ who makes everything a thousand times worse. And, speaking of - I can’t  _ believe _ we’re not going to take advantage of this. I understand that it’s not ‘heroic’ to use this situation to our advantage, but tell that to the next people whose  _ lives _ get ruined because of that creep.”

“Maid,” Radar cut through the rant. “Now is not the time or place.”

“That’s my entire-!” He flashed her a look, and she stopped to survey the rest of us. Nobody was  _ disagreeing _ with her, really, but he was right - there were more pressing matters than ethics debates over whether or not to sabotage a . She groaned and stormed out of the room. Stress made people do stupid shit, it seemed. Oddly enough, Shift followed after the supposed middle-aged adult. She’d been looking pretty freaked, too - more than everyone else.

“Uh,” Zack squeaked out, now acclimated enough to the pain that it didn’t make him involuntarily wince. Radar immediately caught on, turning the attention to him.

“Yes, Marionettist?” There was only a touch of frustrating- no, of  _ exhaustion _ in his voice and body language, but that small amount said a lot. It made sense; his fiancee was being kind of a brat. But, again, there were more pressing matters.

“Need talk, can’t.” The last word barely made its way out of his mouth before the pain flared up badly enough that he had to stop.

“That’s fine. Do anything to communicate, and I’ll understand.”  _ Right. _ He’d done this not too long ago - Shy brought it up a day or two before Shift escaped the Red Iron. Keeping even his  _ power _ a secret made the earlier paranoia about what the adults weren’t telling the Wards feel a little less like paranoia and a little more like reasonable concerns. But  _ again, _ there were more pressing matters.

Zack took a deep breath, scrunched up his eyes, opened the right one and moved his eye from the top of its range to the bottom, then released the tension from his face, straightened his back, and cracked the knuckles of his two index fingers. The actions themselves were meaningless, but they were what felt  _ right _ to do when he was acting them out. He didn’t really care what other people thought of it. And it worked, after Radar taking a moment to process it.

“I figured you’d know this, Marionettist, but her intentions don’t matter. If Forecast isn’t successful, we have no choice but to move to lethality.” The ‘if’ felt a lot more like a ‘when’, but Zack didn’t care. The one bit of intel he had to offer was immediately shut down - the  _ only _ thing to come out of their first plan that wasn’t a disaster. There was nothing more he could do there, so he was done.

He tossed out a small wave goodbye to the heroes who were present and headed off to find the injured. Boon was surely attending to them, but there were at least a dozen just from the group they’d brought in, so he’d probably appreciate an extra set of hands. If not, he could always just be there for Mortar. He wasn’t going to get his hopes up, though. For all he knew, she’d be asleep.

It didn’t take long before he found where they were being kept - they had a mini-hospital for those that could be handled by Boon alone. There wasn’t much room for everyone, but they’d managed to get a surprising amount of people to fit. Most of them were on cheaper beds that must’ve been rolled in from elsewhere, since they didn’t tend to have over half the heroes down and out at the same time. Now that Zack thought about it, there might not  _ ever _ have been any non-PRT powerless folks in the place before that very moment.

With a quick scan, he found Mortar, passed out and hooked up to some of the stronger of Boon’s equipment. He went over to Boon, who was being accompanied by a couple of others that seemed to just be there to do maintenance, and stood nearby patiently while the poor guy finished hacking away at an overgrown chunk of bone. For how much Zack begrudged his power, at least he didn’t have to do  _ that _ kind of thing with any frequency.

So, naturally, he offered to do that kind of thing the instant Boon had a free moment. The offer was declined, but he  _ was _ given the option to sit by Mortar and check on her legs every few minutes to make sure they hadn’t grown sideways or something like that. He gladly accepted, and squeezed between two beds into a very tight crevice that he fit well enough into.  _ Perks of being small, I guess. _

With Mortar asleep, and him functionally mute until he bothered Boon for a fixup, Zack decided to just imagine how their talk would go, when she woke up and everything involving Leech was just a bad nightmare. He was pretty good at that, usually.

_ “Hey, Rocket, how you feeling?” _

_ “Weird.” And she’d sit up and look at her hands, open and close them a few times, feeling the power pumping through her body like blood. “Better.” _

_ “Yeah.” _

_ “You’ve never called me that before.” _

_ “What better time to give you a new nickname than now?” _

_ “Literally any other time?” And we’d laugh, solidifying that everything was alright. We’d both make it out of this unscathed, and we’d get back to doing what we did. And we’d eventually be adults, with so many years of experience that our powers were feared across the land, and.. _

And then Flicker flatlined.

Boon rushed over, detached his tech, and started cutting away at at his chest, smashing through bone with desperation - but not at the expense of precision. He’d done this enough times to know what to do, and how to do it, and he chopped and pulled and tore to the heart.. A rib had grown straight through it, the pressure building up until it pierced through and burst the heart in an instant.

There’d been too many people for him to monitor all of them, and almost all of them had Quaver’s power making things far more difficult. People were displaced, disfigured, and disformed. In Flicker’s case, his chest had been shifted in just a way that gave his death absolutely no warning. Nothing, and surely the rest of the injured were wondering if they’d be next.

Zack vowed to check on Mortar’s legs every minute from then on. He was too exhausted to mourn, or to even really process the loss of one of his superiors, so he just did what he could. Everyone had to play their part, if they wanted to make it out of this alive. And even if they did, it wouldn’t be like he’d imagined - you didn’t just bounce back from this. The consequences of today were going to eat at them for years to come.

“Hey.” He looked over to the voice, and Shy popped into view. She was sitting on the other side of Mortar’s bed.  _ Oh. _ “Just got here, don’t worry,” she cooed. He shrugged - he never really cared if she was ‘spying’ or whatever, even before he understood why. It never really felt like she was trying to get dirt or anything, she just.. well, she was aptly named.

Slipping a hand under the bed, he reached for hers. She grabbed it and rubbed her thumb against his. Every minute, he’d let go to make sure their teammate was okay, then go back to how he was, leaning his head against the side of the bed.

He hoped they would survive the day. As bad as he felt for those who’d be sent out next, he was thankful that he’d gotten out early on, and that Shy’s power was deemed too risky. She was a really nice friend, if nothing else. And-

The weight of the death finally hit him, tearing through the shock and doing more damage to his ability to breathe than his self-inflicted damage had. Flicker was gone, and more were going to follow. If they didn’t manage to stop her soon, what would come next? Who would fall? How many of his friends wouldn’t live to see tomorrow?

He closed his eyes, squeezed Shy’s hand, and worked on picking a god to start with. One of them had to be real, right? One of them would help. Gods killed other gods, and Leech seemed about as close to that as a person could get. Who knew, maybe she’d be the one to answer his prayers. If he could just  _ understand, _ maybe things would be okay.

* * *

**Fade - Phoenix 7.3**

“What in the  _ hell _ is going on out there?” The answer to Forecast’s question was a particularly rude  _ ‘mind your own business’ _ in the form of three thick slices through his livingroom. It wasn’t  _ his _ livingroom, on a technical level, but it also wasn’t a  _ room _ on a technical level anymore. Once the sound faded, he navigated his way through the warped space to Kid Napper and Fumer’s room, going inside without warning.

“Hey boss,” Fumer said, the words crawling out at a snail’s pace.

“‘Hey boss’? The  _ sky _ is falling, and that’s all you have to say?” His silhouette shrugged through the protective screen. Forecast tightened his grip and turned to Kid Napper - passed out and oblivious. “Napper!” The inappropriately named young adult jolted awake, smashing his head against the bedframe above him.

“Jesus- Augh!” He rubbed his head and groaned.  _ “What, _ boss?”

“Don’t ‘what’ me. It’s your fault you always insist on the bottom bunk, even with the knowledge of how many  _ dozens _ of times this has happened. Hell, why do we even  _ have _ a bunk bed? It’s just you and Fumer in here.”

“Meh.” He crossed his arms.

_ “Anyways.” _ Forecast had to cut the conversation off early, or the idiot would insist upon discussing it for more time than they likely had. “The Red Iron and Aviary conflict has gone an unexpected direction, you need to get in there and figure out what’s changed.”

“Guh, fuck, how bad can it-” Kid Napper cut himself off as he noticed the destruction in the room behind Forecast. “Shit, okay.” He shuffled around and got up, moving over to his friend. “Fumer, give me a hit.”

Forecast left before they got started, heading over to the girls’ bedroom. The area right outside had been hit by the space warping effect, but he was able to squeeze through well enough. The door opened partway before getting snagged on something. With a shove, it budged, and he was inside.

“Durabite, Husk,” he called out. The latter was in the corner, shaking and crying, trying to keep her sound level down. It didn’t take long for Forecast to find the former - just a quick glance at what had been blocking the door revealed Durabite, morphed into something even less visually appealing than the usual mess of teeth and mouths. “Ah.” The girl was unmoving, too stunned to do anything other than softly moan in pain -  _ mm, not quite, closer to discomfort  _ \- out of any mouth that was left untouched.

The sporadic nature of the rifts made it clear that this wasn’t a targeted attack, but rather that his building was a byproduct of some grand gesture. If the voice had been that of a boy’s, he would assume this was Quaver’s doing, and would have looked into it immediately. However, it had fairly distinctly been a woman’s voice, which meant any number of things could be at play.

“Well,” he said to the deformed girl, “there there.” With that, he turned back to the other one. “Husk, just stay here and it’ll be fine. I’m going to be heading out, soon.” She nodded, which looked a little odd with her refusing to lift her head from her knees. He let her be, and sat Durabite up against her bed, then left the room.  _ Kids. _

“Holy shit!” Kid Napper yelled, apparently already up again. Forecast went back to that room, taking a deep breath before entering so he could last with shallow ones until he was away. The last thing he needed was Fumer’s gas impairing his abilities at a time like this.

“Report.”

“Jesus, boss, this girl’s- god, so there’s this girl, she’s  _ pissed _ at the Red Iron, especially Willy, used to work with them, feels betrayed I guess. And get this, she steals powers  _ on sight. _ Never seen a damn thing like it. And there’s this thing about her, I tried to get her to stop, but it’s like she’s already got one of me in her head, talking and guiding her. Couldn’t make anything come of it, so I just got some intel and got out of there.”

“Such as?”

“Right, so she’s got a time limit basically, before all the powers go to smoke. They go back to the owners, right, and this happens when she falls asleep. So she’s like raging around and stuff but she’s  _ calm _ about it, conserving her energy. It’s freaky as shit, let me tell you. Nothing I’ve ever seen before, seriously.”

“Mm.”  _ Interesting. Horrifying. Not what I needed to deal with today. _ “Anything else?”

“Nah, not much going on in her head if I’m honest, just the same few thoughts over and over. Was hard to get even what I did.”

“Alright.” He nodded. “Go back in and keep at it, I’m going out.”

“Stay low and near buildings. She can fly.”  _ Of course she can fly you dumb shit, Vulture was there- _

“Thank you.” He closed the door once more and grabbed his mask and a coat. There was little he could do alone, but the heroes would surely be willing to help him enact his plan at a time like this.

The majority of the trip was surprisingly uneventful, despite Leech’s ravings filling the air and causing a few extra obstacles to pop up here and there. Staying out of her sight was little more than tedium, since she’d chosen not to take advantage of her flight. Shortly before arriving at the heroes’ headquarters, he heard some pain and torment that sounded a bit worse than what had happened before, and then she stopped ranting. Someone had done something to shut her up, which was a win in and of itself, regardless of the cost.

Besides all the windows being covered up, the building wasn’t much more secure than usual. He simply walked on through the front door. There weren’t many people there - rushing through rather than anyone actually working the front office - and none of them were capes. It took a surprisingly long time for any of them to pay him any mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm never coming back to this, so I'm going to give you the rest of the story here. What I had planned, at least.
> 
> Leech was going to be defeated by Meteor Maid firing a dumpster into her with Riley's help, it was going to take a big emotional toll on her because murder or whatever, and then the arc would end with Crow leaving the Aviary and wiping all memory of her from both them and the Red Iron except for Riley (not present) and Failsafe (immune) and then go try to live a normal life. Later she'd end up in a relationship with the light-beam blaster from the Mixup Marshals, now Dazzums, because she got a short sentence as per never doing much actual evil and also ratting out her team.
> 
> Next big conflict arc would start with Zenith and Precursor showing up and putting Riley in a situation where she can only save one of her teammate's lives, giving her a personal vendetta against them. Eventually she'd end up in a one on one fight with Zenith, who would push her to the point of a second trigger, and then she'd win.
> 
> Meanwhile, Quinn investigates stuff going on with her and eventually, though a long series of events, discovers that she not only has powers, but she's had them for years. Her power lets her adapt to things far quicker, and significantly faster when it came to power-related things. The power felt so insignificant to her that she repressed it, because she felt like all it did was slightly enhance what she already had - intelligence. This was planned since the beginning, and I'm sad I didn't get to include it.
> 
> Quinn and Barb would've eventually had a fairly stable relationship, believe it or not.
> 
> The only other major thing to say is the ending I'd had planned since the beginning was Quinn in the hospital, laying on her side and watching the news as Riley has been confirmed dead. Over the hundreds of thousands of words writing Riley, that ending became less and less appealing to me, and I likely would've changed it in the end. Who knows.
> 
> There were a lot of other details I had planned, but they don't matter now.
> 
> Thanks for reading Fade, and I'm sorry it ended so abruptly. I'm sure for some of you it's thoroughly disappointing. I'm sure for many others, it doesn't matter more than being kind of a bummer. Or not at all. I don't know. I don't care. Hope you enjoyed the ride. Maybe I'll see you for the next one, coming.. I don't know. Soon, maybe. If not, then farewell.


End file.
